14
July
2015
|
13:13
Europe/London

Manchester presents to the United Nations

The Manchester Institute for Collaborative Research on Ageing (MICRA) will inform a session on the human rights of older people at the UN in New York

Manchester will present to the United Nations this week on its ground-breaking work to improve the lives of older people.

Dr Tine Buffel, of The University of Manchester, will join a panel at the UN in New York to present research around ageing in cities.

The University’s Manchester Institute for Collaborative Research on Ageing (MICRA) has spearheaded a unique project in which older residents, aged between 58 and 74-years-old, were trained as co-researchers to work alongside sociologists exploring the ‘age-friendliness’ of cities.

Today Dr Buffel will present their work, delivered with partners across the city, as part of a three-day UN summit on protecting the human rights and dignity of older people.

Dr Buffel, a research fellow at MICRA at The University of Manchester, said: ‘The age-friendly approach is increasingly recognised as a model which promotes the right to a good old age. This is a fantastic opportunity to present Manchester’s innovative research and practice across the city council, the University and local communities to a global audience. Our experience is that training older people as co-researchers is effective in gaining a deeper understanding of the issues that older people themselves view as important. We want older people to feel that the city belongs to them as much as anyone else – and we believe the age-friendly approach is effective in doing this and can be replicated across neighbourhoods.

Manchester became the first UK city to be recognised as ‘age-friendly’ by the World Health Organisation in 2010. University of Manchester researchers predict that in 15 years time, a quarter of the world’s population living in cities will be over-60.

Notes for editors

Dr Buffel will present at 3pm local time in New York.

Find more details about MICRA’s work on age friendly cities and a link to a short (1.24min) video here: http://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/article/?id=14751

Media enquiries to:

Deborah Linton
Media Relations Officer
Faculty of Humanities
The University of Manchester
Email: deborah.linton@manchester.ac.uk
Tel: 0161 275 8257, 07789 948 783