[custom_adv] Since mid-March, massive floods have hit 26 of homeland's 31 provinces, leaving at least 70 dead. They have forced evacuations, ravaged infrastructures, and incurred heavy losses on the agriculture sector. [custom_adv] The government of President Hassan Rouhani has been mounting relief efforts, enlisting the help of the cash-strapped banking system in the form of cheap or interest-free loans. [custom_adv] The growing but underdeveloped insurance sector has also quickly started reimbursing for damage, while municipalities in some areas hit hardest by the floods provided insurance coverage for local citizens. [custom_adv] However, as might have been predicted under current harsh economic conditions amplified by US sanctions, the annual budget was never going to be enough to cover the hefty damages. [custom_adv] Left with no other choice, officials are mulling withdrawal of as much as two billion euros ($2.25bn) from the country's already strained sovereign wealth fund. [custom_adv] This has suddenly revived a long-standing discussion surrounding the formation of a nation-wide natural disasters insurance fund and whether homeland's response to the floods would have been different if such a fund had been in place. [custom_adv] "I call on all relating entities to regard the bill to establish a natural disasters insurance fund much more seriously as it can be very consequential," Gholamreza Soleimani, head of Central Insurance of homeland, said in a speech last week. [custom_adv] "The recent floods are a serious warning for occurrence of natural disasters in the country and the more serious measures that need to be adopted to contain them," he said. [custom_adv] The idea of establishing such a fund was first floated 16 years ago. It has since been going back and forth within homeland's complicated and time-consuming legislative apparatus. [custom_adv] The bill for the formation of the fund was last in the spotlight in November 2017 when a massive 7.3 magnitude earthquake shook the western parts of homeland. That catastrophe killed more than 600 and left much devastation, some of which has yet to be repaired. [custom_adv] At the time, then-Head of Central Insurance Abdolnasser Hemmati, who currently sits at the helm of the Central Bank of homeland, highlighted the bill and called for its immediate passage through government and parliament. [custom_adv] On 20 March 2019, massive rainfall in the two provinces of Golestan and Mazandaran in homeland brought about heavy flooding. These floods resulted in financial damages to the people living in these areas and also the deaths of two children. [custom_adv] State-run media reports indicated that flash floods had surfaced in 70 villages in Golestan and more than 200 villages in Mazandaran. Iran's Minister of Energy also reported that 360 villages in Golestan province and 193 villages in Mazandaran province had lost electricity due to floods. Coincident with Iran's national holiday, Nowruz,. [custom_adv] The first wave of rain began on 17 March, leading to flooding in two northern provinces, Golestan and Mazandaran with the former province receiving as much as 70 percent of its average annual rainfall in a single day. [custom_adv] Several large dams have overflowed, particularly in Khuzestan and Golestan, therefore, many villages and several cities were evacuated. In many areas, homes and lands have been partially or totally submerged for several days.Portions of Golestan province received 50-70 percent of their average annual rainfall over a five-day period. [custom_adv] Some areas recorded approximately 300 mm (12 in) of rainfall, equivalent to a year's-worth of rain. These amounts exceed any accumulations in the region in at least 70 years. The flooding in Golestan and Mazandaran provinces is considered a 1-in-100 year event. [custom_adv] On 6 April 2019, about two weeks after the flood, the town of Aqqala in the northern province of Golestan, is still covered with lethal flood. Local authorities say "they have to wait for the water to vaporize". [custom_adv] On 25 March, flash floods following heavy rains in Southwestern homeland in the vicinity of the city of Shiraz killed 19 people and injured more than 200 others. Many people were traveling for the Nowruz holiday, and were injured or killed when their cars were swept off of roads. [custom_adv] Rain was short but heavy, lasting in two bursts of approximately 15 minutes each; however, the impact was exacerbated by the heavy road traffic at the time. homeland's Meteorological Organisation gave warnings for further floods, as heavy rains were expected to last at least until 27 March.