Under the theme of “The Journey to Age Equality,” the event was organised by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in collaboration with the Vietnam Association of the Elderly (VAE), the General Office for Population and Family Planning (GOPFP) and HelpAge International in Vietnam.
Population ageing is one of the most significant trends and features of the 21st century. Globally, one in nine people are aged 60 or older, and this is projected to increase to one in five by 2050. Between 2015 and 2030, it is estimated that the number of elderly people worldwide is set to increase by 56% - from 901 million to more than 1.4 billion. By 2030, the number of people aged 60 and above will exceed those aged between 15 and 24.
In Vietnam, the country has officially entered the "ageing phase" since 2011 and is among the most rapidly ageing countries in the world. The proportion of elderly people in the total population has increased to 11.9% and one in nine people were over the age of 60 in 2017. According to the projection of the General Statistics Office of Vietnam, the population of over 60 years old is expected to reach 21 million, accounting for 20% of total population by 2038, and 27 million, accounting for 25% of total population by 2050.
Addressing the forum, Dam Huu Dac, Vice President of the VAE said that Vietnam is one of the countries with the fastest population ageing in Asia. The transition period from the "population ageing" to the "aged population" is about 17-20 years. This creates a range of difficulties in developing policies and programmes for the elderly. Many elderly people are still facing difficulties and challenges in their lives, and need more attention, care and support from the government and communities.
Naomi Kitahara, UNFPA Representative in Vietnam, said that population ageing is not the subject to be ignored in the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. All countries in the world including Vietnam must be prepared for aging when couples start to have a smaller family. She suggested Vietnam to envision a new paradigm that aligns demographic ageing with economic and social growth and ensure social inclusion of the elderly.
Participating in the inter-generational forum were three groups of people over sixty, forty and twenty years old, discussing their experiences, lessons learned and progress on the journey to ending older age inequality and changing negative narratives and stereotypes involving “older age”. Through discussions, the three generations confirmed that age is nothing but a number, and both senior and young generations are valuable in their own right, and elderly people as are active and forward-looking participants in society.
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Foreign visitors to the photo voice exhibition on ICPD and Vietnamese elderly people at the Vietnamese Women’s Museum in Hanoi. (Photo: VNA)
On the occasion, a photo voice exhibition opened the same day at the Hanoi-based Vietnamese Women’s Museum to mark the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD). Running until October 3 under the theme of “Humans of ICPD: Across the life cycle: Right and Choice for All People,” the exhibition showcases 15 photos of ICPD Principles that represent the interrelationships between population and sustainable development, as well as 15 inspiring stories of elderly people in different parts of the country.
