UIC celebrates Europe Day with Roundtable Session on Active Ageing
UIC celebrates Europe Day with Roundtable Session on Active Ageing
On Wednesday, 9 May 2012, the UIC celebrated Europe Day with a roundtable session organized by the UIC Charlemagne Institute for European Studies (ICEE). This year's events formed part of the European Year for Active Ageing and Solidarity between Generations.
The Schuman Declaration of 9 May 1950, a proposal by French Foreign Minister Robert Schuman to pool French and German coal and steel resources marked the beginning of what is now the European Union. When introducing the participants in the roundtable session on active ageing and solidarity, Enrique Banús, the director of the UIC Charlemagne Institute for European Studies (ICEE), said, “Europe Day commemorates these beginnings”. The roundtable participants were Marcelino Cabrera, a member of the representative office of the European Commission in Barcelona, and lawyer Jordi Muñoz.
Cabrera spoke about the future consequences of the increase in life expectancy. He said, “Our only option is a complete overhaul of the pension system. At the moment there are huge numbers of people receiving unemployment and pensions but very few employed people paying into the system”. He went on to say that, while Europeans are generally not overly concerned, it remains a problem. He stated that various ideas are being developed to tackle the situation, including active ageing and progressive retirement schemes, which propose that older people continue some form of activity, depending on their circumstances.
Next, Muñoz explained some of the problems experienced by older people, such as abuse and financial difficulties. To overcome these difficulties, the speaker proposed some of the projects that are under way at European and local level, such as house sharing between the elderly and young people and documents in which the elderly indicate who can take care of them and when to help prevent abuse. The speaker concluded by saying, “In order to achieve active ageing in the future, we must raise awareness about the future among young people”.