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Promoting active and healthy ageing

The European Social Network (ESN) joins the AFE-INNOVNET thematic network on innovation for age-friendly environments, a European project that aims to develop innovative evidence-based solutions to promote active and healthy ageing and to develop age-friendly environments across the EU. The project was launched on 4th of March and involves 27 stakeholders from 16 countries, mainly local authorities, European networks and research organisations. It is coordinated by AGE Platform Europe and financed by the European Commission.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) established the Age-Friendly Cities programme and guidelines to promote age-friendly environments in 2005. According to the WHO, physical and social environments are key determinants of whether people can remain healthy, independent and autonomous long into their old age. In light of these findings, the AFE-INNOVNET thematic network aims to support the development of age-friendly environments as an effective approach to respond to the demographic change.

Although innovative solutions supporting active and healthy ageing have been developed into pilot schemes across the EU, they often remain isolated and do not get scaled up. This project seeks to enable local and regional authorities and other stakeholders to join, link up, benefit from each other’s experience and work together on shaping the EU agenda on active and healthy ageing. The overarching goals of the network are to:

  • mobilise a wide range of local and regional authorities and other stakeholders – industries, research centres, universities, civil society organisations – to link up, benefit from each other’s experience and work together to promote initiatives on age-friendly environments across Europe;

  • develop methodologies to help local and regional authorities assess the socio-economic impact of age-friendly environments and the benefits of involving older people in the co-production of age-friendly environments solutions;

  • develop a repository of notable and replicable practices in innovative solutions for age-friendly environments with associated socio-economic evidence;

  • launch an EU Covenant on Demographic Change to create the necessary political and technical framework to bring together, in a more formal and long-term structure, local and regional authorities and other stakeholders across Europe, using the model of the existing Covenant of Mayors on sustainable energy.

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The European Social Network (ESN) will be involved in the frame and design of the online repository for notable practices in innovative solutions for age-friendly environments, as well as in the collection of notable practices to feed into the repository.

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