French Insurance Code
In forceInsurance contracts taken out by any natural or legal person other than the State and covering fire damage or any other damage to property located in France, as well as damage to the bodies of land motor vehicles, entitle the insured party to cover against the effects of natural disasters, including those of subsidence due to underground cavities and marl pits on property covered by such contracts.
In addition, if the insured is covered against business interruption, this cover is extended to the effects of natural disasters, under the conditions laid down in the corresponding contract.
For the purposes of this chapter, the effects of natural disasters are considered to be uninsurable direct material damage caused by the abnormal intensity of a natural agent, when the usual measures to be taken to prevent such damage could not prevent it from occurring or could not be taken. Also considered to be the effects of natural disasters, within the meaning of this chapter, and covered by the associated guarantee scheme, are the costs of emergency rehousing of disaster victims whose main residence has been rendered unfit for habitation for reasons of safety, health or hygiene, resulting from this uninsurable direct material damage, the determining cause of which was the abnormal intensity of a natural agent. The procedures for covering these costs are set by decree.
A state of natural disaster is declared by an interministerial decree which determines the areas and periods in which the disaster occurred and the nature of the damage resulting from the disaster covered by the guarantee referred to in the first paragraph of this article. This decree specifies, for each municipality that has applied for recognition of the state of natural disaster, the ministers' decision, which must be clearly, detailed and comprehensible, and must include the grounds for appeal and the time limits for appeal, as well as the rules for communication of administrative documents, in particular the expert reports on which the decision is based, in accordance with the conditions laid down by decree. This decision is then notified to each municipality concerned by the representative of the State in the department, specifying the conditions for communication of the expert reports. The decree must be published in the Journal officiel within two months of the applications being submitted to the prefecture. Exceptionally, if the investigations conducted by the representative of the State in the département take longer than two months, the order is published no later than two months after the file is received by the minister responsible for civil protection.
No communal application for recognition of the state of natural disaster can give rise to a favourable decision to recognise the state of natural disaster by interministerial decree when it is made twenty-four months after the start of the natural event that gave rise to it.
The underground cavities in question may be natural or man-made. In the latter case, this chapter does not apply to damage resulting from past or current mining operations.
Within the limits of its resources, the Caisse Centrale de Réassurance carries out, at the request of the ministers responsible for the economy, ecology and public accounts, studies relating to prevention policy, natural risks, their coverage and the financial equilibrium of the natural catastrophe system.
