The insurance industry plays a critical role in South Africa’s financial services ecosystem, protecting households, businesses, and industries from risk. The sector contributes to financial stability and household resilience, from life insurance and short-term insurance to employee benefits and medical schemes. It is also a significant employer, offering opportunities in sales, underwriting, claims, compliance, IT, and actuarial science.

The Insurance Sector Education and Training Authority (INSETA) is funded through the Skills Development Levy and mandated to close skills gaps within insurance and related financial services. Its work is aligned with the National Skills Development Plan (NSDP) 2030, with a focus on improving professional standards, promoting transformation, and ensuring that the industry is inclusive and future-ready.

Major employers include companies such as Sanlam, Old Mutual, Discovery, Hollard, OUTsurance, Momentum Metropolitan, and Liberty, as well as brokers, reinsurers, and smaller niche insurers. The industry is tightly regulated under the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA), which requires continuous professional development (CPD), making INSETA’s role in training particularly important.

Labour market dynamics reveal several tensions. The sector has a steady demand for skilled professionals in actuarial science, risk management, compliance, and digital insurance, on the other hand, the industry is experiencing redundancies in traditional sales and administrative roles due to automation, artificial intelligence, and self-service platforms. Retrenchments have particularly impacted call-centre workers and sales agents, many of whom are young entrants.

Unemployment challenges are compounded by barriers to entry with actuarial and finance roles requiring high-level mathematics, while compliance and claims handling need technical knowledge. This creates mismatches, as many graduates in general business or humanities struggle to find pathways into insurance. Youth and women are active in sales and service roles but remain underrepresented in executive and technical positions.

INSETA’s interventions include bursaries for actuarial and finance students, learnerships for brokers and call centre staff, and digital literacy initiatives to prepare workers for insurtech. The SETA is also tasked with advancing transformation, ensuring more black professionals and women access leadership opportunities in a historically exclusive sector.

As the industry faces rising risks in climate change, pandemics, cybercrime therefore demand for insurance products is growing. This creates new opportunities for product innovation, fintech integration, and customer-focused services. SMEs and micro-insurance providers can also open access for low-income households, providing inclusive growth.

The insurance sector must adapt to technological disruption while safeguarding inclusive employment through re-skilling workers and expanding opportunities for youth and women, and the seta and learning institutions can ensure the industry’s resilience and relevance in a changing world.

Questions for the Future

How can the sector better align graduate training with emerging insurtech and digital roles to reduce skills mismatches?

What strategies could help retrenched sales and admin staff transition into new growth areas like customer analytics or fintech services?

How can the sector expand opportunities for black professionals and women to enter actuarial, compliance, and leadership positions?