Age-Friendly Environments (AFE) ECHO Program

The WHO Global Network for Age-friendly Cities and Communities (GNAFCC) was established in 2010 to connect cities, communities and organizations worldwide with the common vision of making their community a great place to grow older in. The mission of the Network is to stimulate and enable cities and communities around the world to become increasingly age-friendly.

Given the extensive experience of Network Affiliates and members, there is an opportunity for more experienced leaders to mentor those that are new to this work. Recognizing the invaluable benefits that Mentorship programmes provide, the WHO set up, with support from the International Federation on Ageing (IFA), the Age-friendly Environments Mentoring Programme (MENTOR-AFE) to help develop and strengthen skills and competencies of individuals through one-to-one mentor-mentee relationships.

The programme generated a high number of requests which could not be fully met through the mentor-mentee programme. To respond to the demand, WHO and IFA have developed another initiative under this programme: Age-Friendly Environments (AFE) ECHO – a multi-session learning cycle, developed and guided by the needs of mentee applicants and aligned with approaches and guidance from WHO on age-friendly cities and communities.

The Age-Friendly Journey: An Introduction

Globally populations are ageing and increasingly in towns and cities rather than rural and remote areas. The experience of older age and the opportunities it affords are strongly influenced by the physical and social environments in which we are born, live, play, work and age. By creating supportive and inclusive places with the right policies and services, communities can create environments that empower older people to be and do what they have reason to value.

Key principles for creating age-friendly cities and communities around the world include the participation of older people, equity, intersectoral collaboration, life-course approach and multilevel governance. These will all be explored in the first session.

Learning objectives:

Participants will be able to:

Improve understanding of the importance of age-friendly environments in the context of a life-course approach to healthy ageing and in response to key megatrends – urbanization and demographic change
Understand the history and key features of the WHO Age-friendly Communities Framework and programme cycle
Understand what an age-friendly community can achieve.

Engage and Understand

The engage and understand phase is critical to the needs and experiences of older people and other communities’ members in order to gain political commitment and generate ownership among all stakeholders.

Knowing how to start this process, who to engage and what tools are available to support this process notably to do a context analysis and an age-friendly assessment are the subject of this session.

Learning objectives:

Participants will be able to:

Describe mechanisms to build a network of stakeholders
Describe steps to identify the needs of the older population
Understand steps needed to analyze the challenges and opportunities in a community and define priorities for action
Describe strategies used to influence and inform the political commitment for age-friendly initiatives
Describe what successful engagement looks like and the anticipated outputs

Plan Strategically

Developing and implementing a comprehensive age-friendly strategy, that aligns with the needs and assets of older people requires local stakeholders across sectors to agree on a common vision, identify priorities, and develop a plan that leverages the strengths of various stakeholders.

How to create a shared vision and develop a strategy and action plan informed by the findings of the context analysis and age-friendly assessment and ongoing deliberations with stakeholders is the focus of this session.

Learning objectives:

Participants will be able to:

Describe the purpose, process, and key success factors in delivering an age-friendly strategy and action plan.
Describe the steps needed to develop a comprehensive strategic plan
Understand the importance of defining common objectives, aims, targets and stakeholder responsibilities
Identify strategies for securing support and resources;

Act and Implement

Taking action is at the heart of efforts to create an age-friendly city or community. After the assessment, consultation, and strategic planning stages, concrete actions need to be taken.

There are a large number of actions that can be taken to impact the lives of older people. Considering scientific evidence on effectiveness, estimates of costs of investment, stakeholders’ experiences of implementing similar interventions, outcomes and impact can inform the action plan. Action planning and coordinating different stakeholders, while keeping older people meaningly engaged in the process, are all key to bringing about transformative change are the focus of this session.

Learning objectives:

Participants will be able to:

Understand the importance of consulting on the action plan and involving older people at all stages
Describe the process for designing a successful action plan
Understand the steps needed to implement an action plan; and scale up successful action
Understand the importance of learning from successful action in local, national and international networks

Monitor and Evaluate Progress

The success and sustainability of an age-friendly action plan is measured by its ability to show achievements but also to evolve in response to local changes in context and needs. This depends on robust monitoring and evaluation.

Understanding whether a community has become more age-friendly (outcome and impact assessment) and how a community has become more age-friendly (process evaluation) can demonstrate the benefits of the actions but also help to sustain political commitment and ensure future funding for age-friendly initiatives.

Learning objectives:

Participants will be able to:

Describe the steps needed to monitor processes continually
Understand the principles needed to undertake both outcome and impact evaluations
Describe strategies for sustaining and improving action informed by evidence

The Hub team

Hub Team

Mikiko Kanda

Mikiko Kanda

WHO Western Pacific Regional Office

Fiona Martin

Fiona Martin

Government of Queensland

Rebecca Delaforce

Rebecca Delaforce

Government of Western Australia

Dr Kathleen Brasher

Dr Kathleen Brasher

Research Fellow

John Richards Centre for Rural Ageing Research, La Trobe University

Diane Turner

Diane Turner

Government of New Zealand

Media Toolkit

The IFA would be grateful for your support in sharing information around the 3^rd English edition of the AFE ECHO programme throughout your extensive network.

We hope through the various options below organizations will be able to promote the Age-friendly Environments ECHO Mentorship Program.

Click here to download the Press Release

Click here to download the Newsletter sample post

Click here to download the Age-friendly Environments ECHO Mentorship Program promotional tile

Click here to download the Social Media toolkit

How does AFE ECHO work?

AFE-ECHO participants are taken through the main components of the WHO age-friendly framework by global experts, towards building competencies to lead, influence, and implement the development of age-friendly environments. Each session will also create a space for participants to apply what they learn through collaborative problem-solving. AFE-ECHO creates a forum where participants learn from one another by refining and testing knowledge through local case studies, with a long-lasting impact far beyond that of a webinar or an e-learning course.

AFE-ECHO comprises of five 1-hour sessions taking place bi-weekly over a 3-month period, and are held in virtual format over Zoom. In accordance with the standards of the ECHO model, participants are expected to attend all sessions, as the experience and knowledge is cumulative. Every AFE-ECHO learning cycle focuses on four key areas: