Between hurricanes, forest fires, extreme heat, and — as Drake now knows — flash flooding, Canadian enterprises have a lot to worry about when it comes to the weather.
Driving the news: As Toronto continues to tidy up following Tuesday’s torrential downpour the Insurance Bureau of Canada (IBC) estimates that damages from the event could easily exceed $1 billion, making it one of the most expensive natural disasters in Canadian history.
- The IBC expects costs to far outstrip those that resulted from a similar flood in 2013 due to the damages to Toronto’s infrastructure and transit, per the Toronto Star.
Big picture: In addition to damages, flooding and power outages effectively shut down economic activity in Canada’s largest city for most of the day. Movie theatres cancelled screenings, restaurants closed, and — with 167,000 hydro customers losing power — workdays were definitely derailed.
Why it matters: Extreme weather events have grown so frequent that businesses can no longer ignore their economic impact. A new KPMG survey found that 56% of Canadian businesses suffered losses because of extreme weather last year and 92% of business owners and execs fear their companies will be affected by climate incidents this year.—QH