Research related to the economic impacts of climate change has been growing and gaining momentum, according to the webinar Climate Change Risk & Resilience: Facing the Facts, Thursday presented by the Insurance Information Institute as part of this year’s virtual, online Joint Industry Forum.

“The climate and sustainability agenda has been our fastest-growing workstream over the last several years,” said Tim Adams, president and CEO of the Institute of International Finance, which consists of 450 institutions across the full spectrum of financial intermediation, including 35 of the world’s largest insurers and reinsurers.

“The research around climate-related impact, in particular, has really taken off over the last several years,” Carolyn Kousky, executive director, Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center, adding that the research “is being addressed by a wide range of disciplines.”

The interest in addressing climate change and growth of the movement began primarily in Europe, Mr. Adams said, but “over the last year more and more countries have made climate pledges, such as Japan and China. “Climate is a global problem which requires a global solution,” Mr. Adams said.

Last summer, Mr. Adams started the U.S climate working group, “in anticipation of a possible change in administration in Washington, knowing if we do have a different administration, a Biden administration, we’d have a very different trajectory with respect to climate,” Mr. Adams said.

Susan Holliday, senior adviser, International Finance Corporation, The World Bank Group, also sees a local element to the climate change agenda.

“Climate is an issue which is both totally global – what happens in one country or one continent can have an impact in the rest of the world – but it’s also intensely local,” she said. “People care about what happens in their state, in their town, in their city.”

Research related to the economic impacts of climate change also has a wide base of constituents.

“A lot of the work at our center focuses on social science approaches to these problems, but we’re seeing interest across departments, universities and that’s reflective of the fact that climate change is likely to impact every sector of our economy and impact will likely worsen in the coming years, and we’re going to see economic impacts as we begin this transition to a low carbon economy,” said Ms. Kousky.

For insurers, addressing the impacts and potential economic consequences of climate change must go beyond simply paying claims.

“We need to look at climate in terms of prevention and mitigation as well as compensation,” Ms. Holliday said. “To only look at compensation and ignore the other two angles is not sustainable.”