Expert organizations call for policy changes to advance technology, health, care, and urban design solutions in Japan and globally

(New York & Tokyo, April 9, 2019) – Today, the Global Coalition on Aging (GCOA) and the Health and Global Policy Institute (HGPI) published a new report, The Impact of Innovation Across Technology, Health, Care and Urban Design for Super-Ageing Societies. The report offers recommendations on these critical topics to policymakers and other leaders across global society, based on a joint expert meeting convened by GCOA and HGPI on November 2, 2018.

“Increased longevity and the parallel trend of radically declining birth rates lead to a world in which there will soon be more older people in society than young,” said Michael W. Hodin, PhD, CEO, GCOA. “This transformation requires policy changes that enable our older populations to stay healthy, active, productive, and happy contributors for as long as possible – thus creating a path to economic growth and fiscal sustainability.”

As the world’s oldest nation, Japan is the first to face major challenges due to demographic aging, and the trends are expected to continue for decades to come. To ensure a sustainable future for Japan’s health care and financial systems requires a paradigm shift and policy support that leverages aging as an opportunity rather than a crisis. While Japan is ahead of the rest of the world, this demographic transformation and resulting challenges will apply globally, and Japan must set the stage for appropriate reforms.

“Japan is the world’s first super-ageing society, a leader in policy, scientific, and technological innovations, and host of the G20 in 2019,” said Ryoji Noritake, CEO, HGPI. “This combination creates a clear opportunity to activate policy changes and public-private partnerships and strengthen our focus on innovation to ensure that Japan’s super-ageing society and super-ageing societies that follow are prepared for this unprecedented global mega-trend.”

GCOA and HGPI’s November 2018 expert meeting in Tokyo led to the report’s recommendations. The meeting included global and Japanese leaders from government, the private sector, academia and global institutions. Conversations centered on age-friendly communities, health, and financial policy for super-ageing societies and partnerships for an age-friendly world.

These recommendations, geared toward setting the global agenda in 2019 and beyond, including at the 2019 G20 Osaka Summit, focus on the themes of social change, lifelong economic participation, promoting innovation for super-ageing societies and new possibilities for care.

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About the Health and Global Policy Institute
The Health and Global Policy Institute (HGPI) is a Tokyo-based independent and non-profit health policy think tank, established in 2004. Since its establishment, HGPI has been working to help citizens shape health policies by generating policy options, and to bring stakeholders together as a non-partisan think-tank. HGPI’s mission is to improve the civic mind and the well-being of individuals, and to foster sustainable, healthy communities by shaping ideas and values, reaching out on global needs, and influencing society. HGPI is committed to activities that bring together relevant players in different fields, in order to provide innovative and practical solutions, and to help interested citizens understand policy options from a global, broad, and long-term perspective. For more information, visit https://hgpi.org/en/.