PLEA Network

7 October 2025, Insurance Council of Australia: Extreme weather costs: the silver medal we don’t want. New data released by the Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) today shows that Australia has consistently taken the silver medal for extreme weather losses over the last 45 years – beaten only by the United States. The data uses both the insured and broader economic costs of extreme weather, averaged across the populations of each of six developed countries in order to accurately compare the growing impact of extreme weather. Published as part of the ICA’s annual 2024-25 Insurance Catastrophe Resilience Report, the data from Munich Re’s NatCatSERVICE global database shows that for most of the last 45 years Australia has ranked second only behind the United States for economic and insured losses per capita – and was only pushed into third place in the last five years by two extraordinary events in New Zealand. Each decade since 1980, inflation-adjusted losses from floods, bushfires, storms and extreme cold temperatures have climbed across the globe, with the Report looking at France, Canada, and Germany in addition to Australia, New Zealand and the United States. Australia’s persistent second place reflects our unique geography and exposure to natural perils, compounded by the growth of populations in higher-risk areas and infrastructure that has not been built to withstand the impacts of a changing climate. Also included in the Report is updated data on the cost of extreme weather over the past 12 months, with insured losses reaching almost $2 billion across three events – the North Queensland Floods ($289m), Ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred ($1.43b), and the Mid North Coast and Hunter floods ($248m). Read more here