The First BRICS Meeting on Ageing will take place during 6-7 December 2017 in Beijing, China. The meeting will be hosted by the China National Committee on Ageing (CNCA), Renmin University of China (RUC) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in China and organized by the China Research Centre on Ageing (CRCA) and the Institute of Gerontology of RUC.

The five BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) in 2015 were home to over 380 million older persons ages 60 and above, representing about 42% of the world’s , a trend projected to move upwards to 630 million in 2030 and about 940 million in 2050 and to about 45% of the world total. Such a rapid increase in both the number and proportion of older persons will have multi-faceted implications for the social and economic development of BRICS countries, along with their social and economic transition in the coming decades.

This meeting aims to provide a comprehensive review of the developments in the field of population ageing in BRICS countries, particularly their common challenges, analyze national experiences in coping with and harnessing the opportunities presented by ageing, and come up with findings and recommendations for the BRICS countries as well as others. Considering the significance of BRICS countries both in demographic and economic terms, the experiences of these countries in coping with their population ageing, particularly their innovations in policies and programmes, will have implications beyond the BRICS countries, and could inform future South-South Cooperation (SSC)initiatives by the BRICS with other developing countries.

The 2017 meeting will essentially be an academic event, with three components: 

• Responses of BRICS countries to population ageing: current situations of ageing in BRICS countries, major challenges, experiences of responding to ageing, particularly roles that population policies have played in responding to ageing, and
  suggestions for further cooperation on ageing among BRICS countries;
• Data on ageing in BRICS countries: selected research institutions will be invited to present on some of the major data sets from BRICS countries and brainstorm on how to promote collaborations in the area of ageing data in BRICS countries；
• Innovative practices on ageing in BRICS countries: selected research institutions and/or enterprises will be invited to present on their innovations, relevant Government policies, typical cases as well as benchmarks in terms of active ageing, healthy ageing and smart ageing, or in the integrated areas in order to further the understanding and explore chances of cooperation.

Policy makers, academia and private sector from BRICS countries as well as those with relevant studies on ageing in BRICS countries are welcome to attend. The meeting will also invite participants from other countries for wider and in-depth discussions on meeting topics.

A meeting secretariat is set up by the three hosts in order to jointly make decision on meeting preparation and organization. For meeting application and any other inquiry, please contact:  bricsmeetingageing@163.com.