Qatar has been on an extreme version of the same ride. With a small population of around 650,000, insurers' business is dominated by the huge risks associated with highly complex, and hugely costly oil, gas and infrastructure projects.

Major project insurance forms the lion's share of the local insurance market, with some $16,000 million-20,000 million of projects currently covered by the industry and another $22,000 million-24,000 million in the pipeline in the next few years.

These risks need to be underwritten on the global insurance markets and Qatar's insurers have suffered every fall and climb in those markets. Insurers are now praying for stability.

For Ian Sangster, deputy general manager for underwriting at the Qatar Insurance Company (QIC), that means there needs to be enough competition to keep process down but not so much that insurers are offering suicidal rates to get business.

Sangster points out that a typical all-risk insurance premium of 0.25 per cent of the overall project cost on a petrochemicals facility is three times higher than the rate three years ago. And, he adds, it is still less than a domestic householder would pay.

'It is subjective to suggest if terms are too high or low. Only time will tell if, for example, the current rate of 3 per cent of contract value for all risk cover on offshore construction, or 0.25 per cent on a petrochems plant, is too much or too little,' he says. 'At the moment there is not enough reinsurance capacity. We have a market that promotes competition but the reinsurance market is too small.'

One of the key issues for Sangster is the image projected by the insurance industry. 'This means making sure we have suitably qualified people up front to deal with the complexity of these large contracts,' he says. 'The old days of simple risk have gone and it is now about the teamwork between the insurer, the broker and the project leader.'

Another issue is financial security, he adds. 'In the past, reinsurers have gone belly-up. The effect of a long bear market that has dug deep into reinsurers such as Munich Re. So syndicates coming here are focused on security. So where we have a huge project finance deal of say $2 billion-4 billion there are a greater number of advisers and lawyers looking at the details to insure the capital for the consortium responsible for the reinsurance. They decide whether the reinsurance company should go in.'

But due diligence works both ways and Sangster says insurers are increasingly having to provide much more information about their financial structures to prequalify for major projects.

In contrast, the personal insurance market is very small, generating only $10 million in premiums annually. However, Sangster says it is growing fast, so much so that QIC is planning to launch a new personal insurance business.

'This is a hard market,' he says. 'Two or three years ago it was ridiculous but stability is here and is seen to be here in certain classes. There is perhaps even a slight softening in some areas but as a general comment I would say we are entering a period of stability. But we need another year of good results.'