The 2015 figures include 240 women Fellows and 42 holders of the CERA designation. Some 50 candidates are expected to qualify as Fellows in the second semester this year.

Qualification is via an accredited university-based system for the more technical subjects, with professional examinations and courses set and presented by ASSA.

ASSA has mutual recognition agreements with the IFoA, the Society of Actuaries in Ireland, the Actuaries Institute of Australia and the DAV, as well as an overarching agreement with the Actuarial Association of Europe. It is hoped that the list will be extended at the IAA meetings in Vancouver.

Life insurance and pensions (including micro insurance) now account for 51 percent of actuarial activity in South Africa. About 13 percent of ASSA’s members are involved in short-term (general/casualty) insurance and 8 percent practice in healthcare. Actuarial involvement in the more technical financial areas of investments, asset management, ERM and banking has grown considerably in recent years and now provides employment to almost 19 percent of ASSA’s members. Banking has been the fastest grower in this regard; in the context of membership growth since 2007, this area absorbed the equivalent of two out of every nine new Fellows.

Having led the development of modelling the AIDS pandemic in South Africa, the ASSA AIDS Committee recently changed its focus to concentrate on more general demographic modelling.

ASSA embarked on a joint venture with a major financial services group in 2001 to support talented children from previously disadvantaged communities. At the end of 2015, this project will be succeeded by a new venture that has the potential to reach even more children and teachers, and make a bigger impact. In addition, ASSA has been sponsoring the Mathematics Olympiad for High Schools in Southern Africa since 2002. It has also joined forces with a South African high school and a women’s organisation to provide additional tuition and social support to a group of orphans from an impoverished community in the Gauteng Province. A recent fund-raising event for charity saw some 200 chief executives of major companies spend a night sleeping on the street. Five of these CEOs were Fellow members of ASSA.

ASSA is a self-governing body, and not regulated by statute. It enjoys a constructive relationship with regulatory authorities for the financial services and healthcare sectors. The regulators approve actuaries for statutory work, but only if ASSA has issued a practicing certificate to the applicant.

Peter Temple completes his two-year term as President at the end of 2015 and will be succeeded by Prof Roseanne da Silva. What Peter likes best about being an actuary is that even though he is in senior management, he still uses his actuarial skills almost daily in his role as Regional Director of Gen Re for the UK, Ireland and South Africa. As Adjunct Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand, Roseanne finds the interaction with bright and enthusiastic students really rewarding, and as an independent consultant, her work is very fulfilling as she gets to help clients solve relatively complex financial problems.

CPD is compulsory for Fellows and Associates, as well as for students who have been members of ASSA for 10 years or more. The current input-based CPD Scheme is being revised and changed into an outcomes-based system.

Fellow members of ASSA have developed in other directions, too. These include working as a game ranger, a national rugby player, a national women’s hockey player, aerobics instructors, and becoming the first South African to become an international chess master, and the holder of several national and international golf and lawn bowls titles for partially-sighted people and the holder of world records for para-athletics.