North American Actuarial Council Highlights

The North American Actuarial Council (NAAC) brings together the nine national actuarial organizations on the North American continent:

• American Academy of Actuaries (Academy) (U.S.-based)
• ASPPA College of Pension Actuaries (ACOPA) (U.S.-based)
• Asociación Mexicana de Actuarios (AMA)
• Asociación Mexicana de Actuarios Consultores (AMAC)
• Canadian Institute of Actuaries (CIA)
• Casualty Actuarial Society (CAS) (U.S.-based)
• Colegio Nacional de Actuarios (CONAC)
• Conference of Consulting Actuaries (CCA) (U.S.-based)
• Society of Actuaries (SOA) (U.S.-based)

The primary purpose of NAAC is to build solid and lasting bridges between the professional actuarial organizations of North America. It provides a forum to promote coordination, cooperation, and trust among the leadership of the participating organizations, who represent actuaries in Canada, Mexico, and the United States. In this spirit, NAAC members exchange and share information on significant current activities, discuss profession-wide issues (not necessarily involving all participating organizations) and, wherever possible, develop an action plan to address those issues.

In 2010, the NAAC:

• Continued to discuss a tri-country cross-border discipline agreement among Canada, Mexico, and the United States. Through in-person meetings and conference calls, NAAC's two task forces on this issue—the Task Force on a Trilateral Cross-Border Discipline Agreement and the Task Force to Describe Actuarial Work in Another Jurisdiction—continued to make progress toward a draft agreement.
• Expanded the work of the NAAC Collaborative Research Group. Created at NAAC's February 2009 meeting, the group's mission is six-fold:
• Share information about each organization's research priorities and initiatives;
• Promote collaboration;
• Minimize duplication;
• Brainstorm on topics for potential partnered research by the organizations;
• Identify research projects with a potential for public policy advocacy;
• Coordinate funding as needed.

The Collaborative Research Group has been holding monthly conference calls. One project that resulted is joint SOA and CAS funding of a study on the risk of severe inflation and deflation. The group also has been sharing information on ongoing projects, among which are the Actuaries Climate Volatility Index, the work of the Joint Risk Management Section, and research on medical errors, retirement, and accounting.

• Supported increased information sharing among NAAC member organizations.
• Disciplinary Reform in the United States
  The Council of U.S. Presidents reported to NAAC on CUSP's current efforts to overhaul the U.S. profession's disciplinary system and processes. The CUSP report detailed the proposed system's structure and the steps each U.S. actuarial organizations must take to ensure it is implemented

• Mexican Members' Presentation on Implementing Solvency II in Mexico
  NAAC's Mexican members shared information on how Mexico is undergoing the change to a financial reporting system based on Solvency II principles. They have described the economic, political, and regulatory challenges arising from Solvency II.

• Mexican Members' Presentation on the Mexican Actuarial Profession
  Mexican members delivered a presentation on the widely varied fields in which actuaries work and on the relationship between their university-based credentialing system and the profession