Government of Singapore – Action Plan for Successful Ageing

Singapore’s population is ageing rapidly. In 2015, around 1 in 8 Singaporeans were aged 65 and above, and we expect this to increase to 1 in 4 by 2030. Recognising that ageing cuts across several domains such as health, social and employment, and required a whole-of-government response, a Ministerial Committee on Ageing (MCA) was formed to coordinate government policies and programmes relating to population ageing. The Action Plan for Successful Ageing was subsequently launched by the MCA in 2015, as a national blueprint of initiatives to help Singaporeans age confidently and lead active lives, with strong bonds with family and community.

Since then, Singapore has built up its community-based infrastructure to support its ageing population through a nationwide system of proactive outreach by volunteers. It has also taken a life-course approach with a focus on upstream prevention through preventive health programmes to support Singaporeans to take charge of their own health early. These are complemented with close coordination of services to ensure our seniors’ psycho-social wellbeing.

Moving ahead, Singapore recognises the need to ensure that our plans continue to meet the evolving needs and aspirations of successive cohorts of seniors. We are therefore in the midst of refreshing the Action Plan such that it also caters to our seniors of tomorrow, who are likely to lead longer lives, be better educated and more digtally-savvy.

As a Network Affiliate and member of the WHO Global Network for Age-friendly Cities and Communities, Singapore will continue to embrace the WHO’s multi-sectoral approach to make our city more age-friendly, and to also serve as catalysts at the regional and global level by promoting the age-friendly cities and communities approach.

For more details of Singapore’s Action Plan for Successful Ageing, please visit our website.

For Singapore’s GNAFCC member profile, please see: https://extranet.who.int/agefriendlyworld/network/singapore/