Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities
PRESS RELEASE
BANGKOK, THAILAND, 22 May 2026 — As climate and disaster risks continue to intensify across Southeast Asia, regional stakeholders explore a more coordinated approach to Climate and Disaster Risk Finance and Insurance (CDRFI), following the conclusion of the Multi-Actor Partnership on Climate and Disaster Risk Finance and Insurance (MAP-CDRFI) Southeast Asia Workshop convened by the Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities (ICSC) on May 20-21, 2026.
“Climate and disaster risks in Southeast Asia are becoming more frequent, more complex, and more costly, with vulnerable communities bearing the heaviest impacts,” stressed ICSC Manager for Climate Policy Janssen Martinez. “Through this regional convening, we hope to deepen understanding of CDRFI beyond technical financing mechanisms and strengthen collaboration among actors working across governance, adaptation, resilience, and development.”
The workshop forms part of the broader MAP-CDRFI initiative, now in its second phase focused on expanding and strengthening regional collaboration on evidence-based and inclusive climate and disaster risk financing approaches in Southeast Asia.
A key highlight of the workshop was the presentation of the “Initial Findings on the Regional Research on MAP-CDRFI in Southeast Asia” by the research team from the University of the Philippines Los Baños (UPLB). The study examined the current CDRFI landscape across the region, identifying existing financing mechanisms, emerging innovations, and persistent gaps in accessibility, governance, affordability, and institutional coordination.
According to UPLB Associate Professor Mark Jay Dating, Southeast Asia already presents promising examples of CDRFI initiatives, including public-private partnerships, social protection-linked financing systems, sovereign risk transfers, and anticipatory financing mechanisms.
“The region continues to face common challenges related to governance, affordability, data systems, and accessibility…The study underscores the importance of stronger regional cooperation in addressing these gaps and advancing more inclusive CDRFI approaches,” Dating noted.
“Strengthening CDRFI [in the region] requires stronger governance, inclusive policies, better coordination, improved technical infrastructures, and stronger integration with broader resilience strategy,” he added.
Throughout the workshop, participants underscored that climate and disaster risk financing should not be treated solely as an insurance or post-disaster response issue, but as part of a broader resilience agenda that includes social protection, adaptation planning, governance, financial inclusion, and community preparedness.
Moderated by Francis Joseph dela Cruz, ICSC Partnerships and Advocacy Advisor and AktivAsia Co-founder, the workshop also reflected growing interest among participants in developing a more sustained regional ecosystem for CDRFI collaboration in Southeast Asia. Participants explored the possibility of establishing a regional platform that could support continued coordination, policy dialogue, peer learning, research collaboration, and capacity-building efforts among actors working on climate and disaster risk financing.
“We see this workshop not only as a space for knowledge exchange, but also as an opportunity to identify practical next steps toward a more coordinated regional approach to CDRFI in Southeast Asia. Existing mechanisms already offer important lessons, but there is still a need for better accessibility, stronger coordination, and more inclusive participation among governments, civil society organizations, academia, cooperatives, and the private sector,” Martinez added.
Present during the workshop were representatives from regional organizations and institutions working on disaster risk insurance, adaptation financing, agriculture, community resilience, and inclusive climate finance, including the Southeast Asia Disaster Risk Insurance Facility (SEADRIF), Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC), Philippine Family Farmers Agriculture Fishery Forestry Cooperatives Federation (AgriCOOPh), Resilience Development Initiative (RDI), Indonesia Research Institute for Decarbonization (IRID), Fair Finance Asia (FFA), Asian Farmers Association (AFA), Expertise France, and the UNFCCC RCC Asia and the Pacific.
This workshop is supported by CARE, Germwanwatch e.V., and the Munich Climate Insurance Initiative (MCII).
ABOUT
The Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities is a Philippine-based non-governmental organization that advances climate, energy, and low-carbon solutions to enable fair and climate-resilient development at the national and international levels.
PHOTOS
(C) Gabe Algar/ICSC
CONTACT
Sanafe Marcelo, ICSC: media@icsc.ngo, +63968 886 3466, +63917 149 5649
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