United Nations Statistical Commission

Background

As the proportion of the world's population in the older ages continues to increase, the need for improved information and analysis of population ageing increases. More granular knowledge is essential to assist policy makers define, formulate and evaluate goals and programmes, and to raise public awareness and support for necessary policy changes addressing the specific needs of overlooked population groups and vulnerable sub-group. This is particularly important in the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the global pledge made by the international community 'to leave no one behind'.

There is an urgent need to bolster the collection, analysis and use of good quality data on age and ageing to effectively evidence the equitable delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals.

The Challenges for statistical systems

To ensure that no one is left behind as we implement the SDGs we need to increase the availability, quality and use of data on older persons. The related challenges are the following:

• Lack of knowledge of existing data on older persons;
• Available data are not disaggregated by age in higher age-groups;
• Household surveys do not cover older age-groups, such as Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) and Labour Force Surveys (LFS) that only include individuals up to age 49 (women) and age 52 (men) and in the case of LFS only cover participants up to age 65.
• Need to develop and strengthen standardized household survey instruments and methodologies to collect the missing information directly from older persons themselves, and across the lifecycle of all household members.
• The routine health information derived from health system such as health centres and hospitals are poorly utilized and not well integrated in the national statistics system, in spite of its potential width and depth of information on the health of older persons.
• The coverage of birth and death registration including the information on causes of death is not universal.

Event purpose and structure

The U.K. Office of National Statistics, the National Statistical Office of Malawi and the Uganda Bureau of Statistics, with the support of the UN Focal Point on Ageing (UN-DESA), UNDP, UN-Women, DFID and HelpAge, are convening a side event on "Exploring the Case for a City group on Ageing and Age-disaggregated Data" on the margins of the 48th Session of the UN Statistical Commission. The aims of the event are:

• to showcase existing initiatives aiming to improve availability of ageing and age-disaggregated data;
• to make the case for a City Group on ageing and age disaggregated data;
• to explore issues and questions arising;
• and to build support for the proposition with national statistical offices and other stakeholders.

Agenda and speakers

1. Opening remarks  5 minutes
   John Pullinger, U.K. Statistics Authority
2. Welcoming remarks  5 minutes
   Rosemary Lane, UN Focal Point on Ageing
3. Pilot survey on Ageing in Malawi  5 minutes
   Karoline Schmid, UN-DESA
4. Recommendations on Ageing-related Statistics  7 minutes
   Lidia Bratanova, UNECE
5. National Statistical Office perspectives on age data  5 minutes
   Lisa Grace Bersales, Philippine Statistics Office
6. Presenting the gaps in relation to data on older people and the SDGs  5 minutes
   Patricia Conboy, Help Age International
7. Introduction to the proposal of a City Group on ageing and agedisaggregated data  5 minutes
   Papa Seck, UN-Women
8. Interactive discussions  25 minutes
   Moderated by John Pullinger as chairperson
9. Next steps and Closing remarks  5 minutes
   John Pullinger


Concept note