The global cargo insurance market is likely to need to innovate to meet the changing nature of the risks it faces leading brokers and underwriters have said.

Speaking during the IUMI Cargo Roundtable 2026 hosted by Emerging Risks and Russell Group at the IUMI annual conference in Rotterdam participants spelt out the threats they face and the need for more concerted action to access vital data on which decisions can be made.

The roundtable was held hours after delegates at the conference heard of the rising crimewave in the cargo market but much of the discussion was focused on the scale of accumulation and exposures risks and the rapidly changing nature of what underwriters were being asked to insure.

The drive for the construction of datacentres across the world has created a new era in project cargo coverage and the discussion highlighted the threats it creates.

There is an intense competition for the parts needed to power these new data centres with gas turbines now in huge demand. Such is that demand that used turbines are now being shipped to facilities where they are enhanced and restored and the process serves to highlight the exposure issue for the cargo market.

In their used state the turbines are valued at $2 million, but when they have been restored the value of the turbine is put at $20 million, given the huge demand. Then turbine then needs to be shipped to the project’s venue, but is now a $20mmillion exposure.

Alongside the leap in costs underwriters said that all too often when the value of the assets, and with it the exposures they are being asked to insure increase massively but those changes in value are simply not communicated so adequate changes can be made.

Port accumulation risk, so long an issue for the market, is only increasing and those around the table said the ability to understand the accumulation on any vessel or port facility remained almost impossible despite the advances in technology.

The data is there they were told but it is how the market uses the data which is failing to meet the underwriters’’ needs.

The cargo market is softening despite the impact of the conflict in the Middle East, and the huge increase in the value of cargo thefts which now average nearly $3 million per incident. The war in the Middle East has created a demand from clients for delay cover, something that the market is both unwilling and unable to meet.

The panel agreed there was now a need for a response to be created to the complexity and interconnected nature of modern cargo risks adding that a soft market was traditionally when innovation was delivered, as when rates harden the need to look to differentiation diminished.

Overall, the feeling was that underwriters recognise the need for greater data and information and much of this needs to come from the clients. However, in the current market both brokers and underwriters remain reluctant to be seen to be too prescriptive amid fear it may see clients look for a less challenging underwriting solution.

Those around the table said they were more than willing to run the risk of such an event in order to ensure they fully understood the risks values of what they were being asked to assume.

The panel agreed there was now a need for a response to be created to the complexity and interconnected nature of modern cargo risks adding that a soft market was traditionally when innovation was delivered, as when rates harden the need to look to differentiation diminished.