(Bloomberg) ? Hannover Re, the world's fourth-largest reinsurer, said it received a licence for life and health reinsurance in China.

The China Insurance Regulatory Commission licence enables Hannover Re to offer customers reinsurance in life, health and personal accident lines and to profit from the "extraordinary growth potential" of the Chinese market, Hannover Re said last week in a statement distributed by the Hugin newswire.

"We are delighted by the CIRC's decision," Hannover Re management board member in charge of life and health reinsurance Wolf Becke said in the statement. The license will help the company "intensify the existing support that we have been providing for our clients through a representative office since 1997."

The Chinese insurance market "is one of the most attractive in the world," Hannover Re said, adding that gross premium volume in the Chinese market was $61 billion in 2005, with $45 billion from life reinsurance and the rest from non-life reinsurance.

Having ranked 11th among major global insurance markets last year, "forecasts suggest China could move up to as high as third by 2020," the reinsurer said. Reinsurers help insurers such as Allianz SE shoulder risks they assume for their clients.