Editorial: Three challenges in realising the MIPAA

Bennett, Rachel ORCID: 0000-0002-5780-8786 and Zaidi, Asghar (2018) Editorial: Three challenges in realising the MIPAA. International Journal on Ageing in Developing Countries, 2 (2). pp. 76-81.

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Abstract

The year 2017 marked fifteen years since the adoption of the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing (MIPAA), deemed to be a major breakthrough in the way the world seeks to support older people. The MIPAA focuses on three priority areas: older persons and development, advancing health and wellbeing into old age and ensuring enabling and supportive environments, and sets out 239 recommendations in relation to its 35 objectives. The Madrid Plan is the successor to the Plan adopted during world’s first international policy framework on ageing, the Vienna International Plan of Action on Ageing (VIPAA) introduced some thirty years earlier in 1982. Although a landmark agreement in its own right, the implementation of the VIPAA was perceived to be of most relevance to advanced economies which already had aged populations, and little progress was made in implementing its’ recommendations in developing countries with younger age profiles (Sidorenkno & Zaidi,2018). The MIPAA reaffirmed commitments made in the VIPAA, but also sought to be of increased relevance in developing as well as developed countries. Further, the MIPAA took an explicitly rights based approach and encouraged the mainstreaming of ageing issues into general policy and development discourses (Sidorenko & Walker, 2004; Marin & Zaidi 2007), with a key commitment being to ‘build a society for all ages’ (United Nations, 2002). Fifteen years since the MIPAA’s adoption, there are 962 million people aged 60 years or over globally, over twice as many as in 1980 when preparations for the VIPAA were underway (UNPD, 2017). This figure is projected to rise to 2.1 billion by 2050 with the biggest growth to be seen in developing countries. Indeed, almost eight in every ten older people globally will live in a developing region by the middle of the century (ibid.). Whilst the MIPAA is not legally binding and responsibility for its implementation lies primarily with national governments, information and best practice sharing at the international level is strongly encouraged. Indeed, the United Nations has been collating evidence for its’ third five-year review on the implementation of the Plan (ECOSOC 2017). Thus, it is a timely opportunity to reflect on progress made in developing countries, as well as to analyse the challenges that lie ahead in regions set to grow old before they grow rich. This special issue of the International Journal on Ageing in Developing Countries brings together regional level perspectives on progress towards the MIPAA from Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean.

Item Type: Article
Article Type: Editorial
Uncontrolled Keywords: Ageing, MIPAA, SDGs, Developing countries
Subjects: G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > G Geography (General)
Divisions: Schools and Research Institutes > School of Education and Science
Research Priority Areas: Place, Environment and Community
Depositing User: Rachel Bennett
Date Deposited: 31 Aug 2018 09:04
Last Modified: 31 Aug 2023 08:58
URI: https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/5812

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