Building an Age-Friendly City – Embedding Gerontechnology Into Everyday Life
Building an Age-Friendly City – Embedding Gerontechnology Into Everyday Life
In 2017, Our Hong Kong Foundation published the city’s first gerontechnology report, which identified 24 gaps representing key opportunities and challenges facing Hong Kong’s gerontech ecosystem at the time. To assess the degree of improvement of these gaps and explore how to further develop Hong Kong's gerontech ecosystem, OHKF was commissioned by the SIE Fund’s Gerontechnology Platform to publish a new report entitled “Building an Age-Friendly City – Embedding Gerontechnology Into Everyday Life.”
Back in 2017, Hong Kong’s gerontech ecosystem was very fragmented. In addition to there not being many suppliers, there were few gerontech products and services available on the market, and these products were not reaching target users. Yet, due to the increase in Government and industry initiatives from the past few years, we have seen an increase in the number of suppliers. Hong Kong’s gerontech ecosystem has become more integrated, enabling more end-users to access and use gerontech. While these are positive signs, we believe more can be done. As such, the Report proposes a series of policy recommendations in five key areas, namely related to supply-side, demand-side, infrastructure, investment, and talent development.
To help supply-side stakeholders, we recommend increasing the opportunities for them to receive user feedback and easing import and export process. For demand-side stakeholders, we recommend extending the existing Innovation and Technology Fund for Application in Elderly and Rehabilitation Care to 100% privately funded elderly homes, as well as extending the coverage of the Elderly Health Care Voucher and Community Care Service Voucher to enable elderly to procure gerontech.
Turning to infrastructure, we recommend the Government to set up a "Gerontech Corner" in District Health Centres to enable elderly and persons with disabilities to more easily access gerontech in their local neighborhoods. We also recommend the Government to extend home modification schemes currently available to elderly and persons with disabilities living in public housing to those living in private housing. Finally, we hope that the Government will attract more parties to grow the gerontech ecosystem. We recommend the Government to seek more gerontech public-private partnership opportunities, particularly through the innovative “Pay-for-Success” financing model. We also recommend the Government to develop more gerontech talent through Qualifications Framework-recognised gerontech professional skill training and robust knowledge transfer-related university policies.
In 2017, Our Hong Kong Foundation published the city’s first gerontechnology report, which identified 24 gaps representing key opportunities and challenges facing Hong Kong’s gerontech ecosystem at the time. To assess the degree of improvement of these gaps and explore how to further develop Hong Kong's gerontech ecosystem, OHKF was commissioned by the SIE Fund’s Gerontechnology Platform to publish a new report entitled “Building an Age-Friendly City – Embedding Gerontechnology Into Everyday Life.”
Back in 2017, Hong Kong’s gerontech ecosystem was very fragmented. In addition to there not being many suppliers, there were few gerontech products and services available on the market, and these products were not reaching target users. Yet, due to the increase in Government and industry initiatives from the past few years, we have seen an increase in the number of suppliers. Hong Kong’s gerontech ecosystem has become more integrated, enabling more end-users to access and use gerontech. While these are positive signs, we believe more can be done. As such, the Report proposes a series of policy recommendations in five key areas, namely related to supply-side, demand-side, infrastructure, investment, and talent development.
To help supply-side stakeholders, we recommend increasing the opportunities for them to receive user feedback and easing import and export process. For demand-side stakeholders, we recommend extending the existing Innovation and Technology Fund for Application in Elderly and Rehabilitation Care to 100% privately funded elderly homes, as well as extending the coverage of the Elderly Health Care Voucher and Community Care Service Voucher to enable elderly to procure gerontech.
Turning to infrastructure, we recommend the Government to set up a "Gerontech Corner" in District Health Centres to enable elderly and persons with disabilities to more easily access gerontech in their local neighborhoods. We also recommend the Government to extend home modification schemes currently available to elderly and persons with disabilities living in public housing to those living in private housing. Finally, we hope that the Government will attract more parties to grow the gerontech ecosystem. We recommend the Government to seek more gerontech public-private partnership opportunities, particularly through the innovative “Pay-for-Success” financing model. We also recommend the Government to develop more gerontech talent through Qualifications Framework-recognised gerontech professional skill training and robust knowledge transfer-related university policies.
