The Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (IFoA) has today announced three leading research programmes to address issues in pensions and insurance such as longevity and health.
31 MARCH 2016 | BY CINTIA CHEONG
The IFoA said the programmes would further actuarial science worldwide. They were chosen following a call for research in August 2015, which collected 25 proposals, involving more than 100 institutions from over 20 countries.
Following a review, the IFoA identified three significant research programmes addressing the following issues:
- Future pension products that meet customer needs, balancing stability, performance and cost, with Cass Business School and Heriot-Watt University, partnering with Blackrock and Danica Pension
- The development of new statistical and actuarial methods in the use of big data, in the context of health and wider applications, with the University of East Anglia, with assistance from technical experts within Aviva
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The development of a new generation of mortality and morbidity models, with a specific focus on the drivers for mortality and the management of longevity risk, with Heriot-Watt University, partnering with Cass Business School, University of Southampton, Aarhus University in Denmark, University of California Santa Barbara and Longevitas
Colin Wilson, president-elect of the IFoA, said: "The programmes complement many of the existing research activities already undertaken within the IFoA, such as our volunteer working parties."
Extending over five years, the three programmes will be run through the IFoA's Actuarial Research Centre (ARC), a virtual network of researchers worldwide to address challenges in actuarial science.
They will form part of the IFoA's programme that will be underwriting £3.1m of research worldwide.
Mark Cross, chair of the IFoA's Research and Thought Leadership Committee, said: "We set out some of the key challenges in actuarial science and were overwhelmed with the response from the actuarial community in how it would seek to address those challenges.
"What we have here are three world-class programmes and I am delighted that they will form the foundations of our newly expanded Actuarial Research Centre."