Grenadians and regional professionals have until 20 April to submit applications for 2013 Extra-Regional Scholarship of the Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility.
The Scholarship/Professional Development Programme of the wider CCRIF Technical Assistance (TA) Programme is providing a maximum of two scholarships annually for citizens of Caricom member countries and/or CCRIF member countries who are desirous of pursuing a Masters or an MBA programme in a number of areas related to disaster management.
A statement from the Fund said that the programme must not be available at regional universities but at universities in the United Kingdom, United States or Canada. Programmes of priority are (Catastrophe) Risk Management; Property/Casualty Insurance; Climate Change; Other hazard/disaster related disciplines or MBA programme with a major in risk management and/or insurance or a related field
Last year, CCRIF provided two extra-regional scholarships to students to pursue a Masters in Public Administration in Environmental Science and Policy at Columbia University in the USA and an MSc in Climate Change and Development at the University of Sussex in the UK.
CCRIF’s TA Programme has been developed to help countries in the region deepen their understanding of natural hazards and catastrophe risk and the potential impacts of climate change. The scholarship component of the TA programme is designed to assist with the creation of a cadre of professionals who can play a key role in developing national and regional strategies that will lead to improved disaster risk management and increased climate change resilience.
Since 2010, CCRIF has awarded nineteen scholarships to students either through its Extra-Regional Scholarship Programme, its University of the West Indies (UWI)-CCRIF scholarship programme or through its cooperation with member countries and regional organisations. Total disbursements to date are in excess of US$200,000.
CCRIF believes that building capacity in catastrophe risk management at the individual level through support for education will ultimately contribute to the main objective of its overall technical assistance programme helping countries in the region deepen their understanding of natural hazards and catastrophe risk and the potential impacts of climate change.
Applications for the extra-regional scholarship programme must be submitted via the CCRIF website at: http://www.ccrif.org/content/extra-regional-scholarship no later than April 20, 2013.
CCRIF is a not-for-profit risk pooling facility, owned, operated and registered in the Caribbean for Caribbean governments. It is designed to limit the financial impact of catastrophic hurricanes and earthquakes to Caribbean governments by quickly providing short-term liquidity when a policy is triggered.  It is the world’s first regional fund utilising parametric insurance, giving Caribbean governments the unique opportunity to purchase earthquake and hurricane catastrophe coverage with lowest-possible pricing.  Since the inception of CCRIF in 2007, the Facility has made eight payouts totalling US$32,179,470 to seven member governments. All payouts were transferred to the respective governments less than a month (and in some cases within a week) after each event.