Esko Aho

 Esko Aho is Executive Chairman of the Board of the East Office of Finnish Industries, a non-profit company of 25 leading Finnish corporations. In addition, he is Chairman of the Board of Cinia Oy and Adven Group. In May 2016, he was elected to the Supervisory Board of Sberbank, Russia´s biggest bank.

Mr. Aho was a Member of the Finnish Parliament for 20 years, from 1983 to 2003. He chaired the Centre Party from 1990 to 2002 and was elected Prime Minister in 1991 at the age of 36, making him the youngest PM in Finland’s history. Under his leadership, Finland joined the European Union. 

After his political career, Mr. Aho served as President of the Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra and then moved on to Nokia Corporation as Executive Vice President of Corporate Relations and Responsibility. Up to the present he has been a Consultative Partner at Nokia. 

Currently, Mr. Aho serves as elected member of the Executive Board at the International Chamber of Commerce. He is an invited member of Club de Madrid, an independent organization of former heads of state and government dedicated to strengthening democracy. 

Throughout his career, Mr. Aho has been active in the world of academia. He has been a Resident Fellow and later Senior Fellow at Harvard University. He is a visiting lecturer at Beijing University and a member of the Industrial Advisory Board at the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA). He is Executive in Residence at Aalto University, where he works at the Department of Management Studies at the School of Business. He is a visiting lecturer at PSIA, Paris School of International Affairs. He also is a member of the International Advisory Board, NTU Institute of Science and Technology for Humanity, Nanyang Technologia University, Singapore. Mr. Aho holds honorary doctorate degrees from the University of Vaasa, Finland, and the University of Alberta, Canada. 

Latest Developments

We keep our members and partners in touch with the most recent updates and opinions in the worldwide dialogue on population longevity and related issues.

What Old Age Might Be Like for Today’s 30-Year-Olds

Get ready for a new old age. With the U.S. fertility rate in a decadelong slump and the life expectancy of 65-year-old Americans approaching roughly 85, our aging nation is likely to grow older by midcentury, as the ratio of young to old continues to decline. The trend is likely to upend how our society is organized, making life very different for today’s 30-year-olds when they reach their 60s compared with life for 60-year-olds now.

World Population Reaches 8bn As It Grows Older

The world’s population reached 8bn people on Tuesday and will hit 9bn in 15 years as it experiences an unprecedented surge in the number of older people, according to the latest UN data. The global fertility rate has more than halved since the 1950s to 2.3 births per woman. With mortality also falling, the number of people aged 65 and over is expected to rise from 783mn in 2022 to 1bn by 2030 and reach 1.4bn by 2043, the UN population data revealed.

Global Coalition on Aging (GCOA) Launches Cross-Sector Alliance Committed to Health Innovation at High-Level Forum on The Silver Economy

Today, the Global Coalition on Aging (GCOA), along with cross-sector stakeholders representing patient advocacy, policy, industry, and academic communities, announced the launch of the Alliance for Health Innovation at the High-Level Forum on the Silver Economy in New York. The Alliance is dedicated to establishing the importance of innovation in achieving healthy aging and health equity through investments, policy reforms, and strategic partnerships.

Japan Must Face Up to Growing Danger of Drug-resistant Germs

In the wake of more than 6.4 million COVID-19 deaths worldwide and unprecedented economic destruction, the global community has no excuse to be caught unprepared for the next pandemic. Yet right now, a devastating parallel plague is already underway and worsening. Some years, it is killing well over 1 million people, according to medical journal The Lancet.

A Bipartisan Bill Could Prevent The Next Pandemic

In Washington, Republicans and Democrats are typically at loggerheads when it comes to healthcare policy. Just consider the recent Inflation Reduction Act, which made extensive changes to Medicare and also extended Affordable Care Act subsidies. Every single congressional Democrat voted for the legislation, while every single member of the GOP voted against it. But occasionally, a bill is such an obviously good idea, and so desperately needed, that it commands significant bipartisan support. The PASTEUR Act, co-sponsored by 31 Democrats and 31 Republicans in the House and two members of each party in the Senate, is just such a bill.

Korea Must Act Now to Combat Growing AMR Threat

Public officials are overlooking one of the gravest long-term threats to the Korean people, the health system, and economy: antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Some pathogens ― bacteria, fungi, parasites, and viruses ― have evolved strains that resist the antimicrobial medications we currently have available to fight them. Health care professionals often must watch helplessly as patients succumb to infections that antibiotics could once have easily beaten. They know that new antimicrobials, including and especially antibiotics, could easily gain the victory ― but they have none at their disposal.

Policy Statement on the Impact of Price Negotiations on Innovation, Healthy Aging and Equity

As the CEO of the Global Coalition on Aging (GCOA) and a newly formed cross-sector Alliance for Health Innovation, we write to express our deep concern with the current legislation that allows for price “negotiations” in Medicare – a thinly veiled signal for America’s plunge into price controls that will have a devastating and adverse impact on biopharmaceutical innovation and our nations’ ability to support healthy aging.