Plan International - Girls' Rights Platform - Girls' rights are human rights: Positioning girls at the heart of the international agenda

8. Recommends that ongoing efforts to achieve the internationally agreed development goals, including those contained in the United Nations Millennium Declaration, 6 take into account the situation of older persons;

Recalling further its resolution 53/109 of 9 December 1998 and previous resolutions on ageing and the International Year of Older Persons,

7. Stresses the importance of the full involvement of all relevant stakeholders, including women, children, older persons, persons with disabilities, indigenous people and other local communities, in the implementation of the Decade at all levels, including its midterm comprehensive review;

10. Invites Member States to ensure that older persons have access to information about their rights so as to enable them to participate fully and justly in their societies and to claim full enjoyment of all human rights;

(vi) Violations of economic, social and cultural rights, which have led to food insecurity, severe hunger, malnutrition, widespread health problems and other hardship for the population in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, in particular for women, children, persons with disabilities, older persons and political prisoners;

21. Recommends that Member States enhance their capacity to more effectively collect data, statistics and qualitative information, disaggregated when necessary by relevant factors, including sex and disability, in order to improve assessment of the situation of older persons, and recognizes that the data revolution presents new opportunities and challenges for the use of new data to help with the measurement of progress in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, in particular its aspects of relevance to older persons, and to ensure that no one is left behind;

(f) Promoting consultation with and the participation of rural women and, as appropriate, girls, including those who are indigenous, those with disabilities and older women, through their organizations and networks, in the design, development and implementation of and follow-up to programmes and strategies for gender equality, the empowerment of women and rural development;

15. Calls upon Member States to develop their national capacity for monitoring and enforcing the rights of older persons, in consultation with all sectors of society, including organizations of older persons through, inter alia, national institutions for the promotion and protection of human rights where applicable;

23. Recommends that Governments be inclusive in involving older persons and their organizations in the formulation, implementation and monitoring of policies and programmes that affect them, including through simple consultative mechanisms to co-research or co-design such policies and programmes with or by older persons and to take due account of involving those who experience multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination and are particularly vulnerable to high incidences of poverty and social exclusion;

30. Urges Member States to develop, implement and evaluate policies and programmes that promote healthy and active ageing and the highest attainable standard of health and well-being for older persons and to develop health care for older persons as part of primary care in the existing health systems;

36. Encourages the international community to support national efforts to forge stronger partnerships with civil society, including organizations of older persons, academia, research foundations, community-based organizations, including caregivers, and the private sector, in an effort to help to build capacity on ageing issues;

16. Urges Member States to develop, implement and evaluate policies and programmes that promote healthy and active ageing and the highest attainable standard of health and well-being for older persons, and to develop health care for older persons as part of primary care in the existing national health systems;

113. Notes with appreciation the measures taken by the Secretary-General, in accordance with its resolutions, to address, among other things, the issue of the replacement of retiring staff in the language services, and requests the Secretary - General to maintain and intensify those efforts, including the strengthening of cooperation with institutions that train language specialists, in order to meet the needs in the six official languages of the United Nations;

Recognizing also the essential contribution that older persons can continue to make to the functioning of societies and towards the implementation of the 2030 Agenda if adequate guarantees are in place, and concerned that many health systems are not sufficiently prepared to respond to the needs of the rapidly ageing population, including the need for promotive, preventive, curative, palliative and specialized care,

8. Calls upon Governments and the United Nations system to ensure that the needs, perspectives and experiences of older women are reflected in all development policies and programmes;

20. Further recognizes the importance of strengthening intergenerational partnerships and solidarity among generations, and in this regard recognizes the importance of opportunities for voluntary, constructive and regular interaction between young people and older generations in the family, the workplace and society at large;

4. Recognizes the challenges related to the enjoyment of all human rights that older persons face in areas such as prevention of and protection against violence and abuse, social protection, food and nutrition, housing, employment, legal capacity, access to justice, health services, including physical and mental health support, and long-term and palliative care services, and that those challenges require in-depth analysis and action to better address them;

35. Encourages the international community, including international and bilateral donors, to enhance international cooperation to support national efforts to eradicate poverty, in keeping with internationally agreed goals, in order to achieve sustainable and adequate social and economic support for older persons, while bearing in mind that countries have the primary responsibility for their own economic and social development;

14. Encourages the international community and the relevant agencies of the United Nations system, within their respective mandates, to support national efforts to provide funding for research and data-collection initiatives on ageing in order to better understand the challenges and opportunities presented by population ageing and to provide policymakers with more accurate and more specific information on gender and ageing;

9. Reaffirms that social integration policies should seek to reduce inequalities, promote access to basic social services, quality education for all and health care, eliminate discrimination, increase the participation and integration of social groups, particularly young people, older persons and persons with disabilities, noting the role of sports in this regard, and address the challenges posed to social development by globalization and market-driven reforms in order for all people in all countries to benefit from globalization;

6. Encourages all States to raise awareness of the challenges facing the enjoyment of all human rights by older persons, and to ensure that older persons receive information about those rights;

Emphasizing that Governments bear the primary responsibility for creating an enabling environment for the economic and social development of their citizens, and noting with appreciation the valuable contributions of civil society, including non- governmental organizations, in calling attention to the specific needs of older women,

Noting with concern that women, persons with disabilities, older persons, children and youth are often disproportionately affected in natural disasters, and stressing the need to ensure that their specific needs are identified and addressed in emergency preparedness and response,

18. Also encourages the international community to support national efforts to forge stronger partnerships with civil society, including organizations of older persons, academia, research foundations, community-based organizations, including caregivers, and the private sector, in an effort to help to build capacity on ageing issues;

22. Encourages the international community and the relevant agencies of the United Nations system, within their respective mandates, to support national efforts to provide funding for research and data-collection initiatives on ageing in order to better understand the challenges and opportunities presented by population ageing and to provide policymakers with more accurate and more specific information on gender and ageing;

9. Requests the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to organize, in Geneva, an intersessional public consultation on the promotion and protection of the human rights of older persons, with the participation of States Members of the United Nations, relevant international organizations, United Nations agencies and stakeholders, in order to receive information and share good practices on the matter;

13. Acknowledge the impact of non-communicable diseases on older persons, which is of particular concern, given the growing proportion of older persons and recognizing that they have an increased risk of multiple non-communicable diseases, which constitutes a major challenge for health systems;

Concerned at the multiple forms of discrimination that may affect older persons and at the high incidence of poverty and isolation among this particularly vulnerable group, especially older women, persons with disabilities, persons of African descent, individuals belonging to indigenous peoples, persons belonging to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities, rural persons, persons living on the streets, migrants and refugees, among other groups,

5. Urges Governments to take measures to enable all older women to be engaged actively in all aspects of life, as well as to assume a variety of roles in communities, public life and decision-making, and to develop and implement policies and programmes in cooperation with civil society, including the non- governmental organizations concerned, to ensure their full enjoyment of human rights and quality of life, as well as to address their needs, with a view to contributing to the realization of a society for all ages;

9. Requests the Commission for Social Development and the Commission on the Status of Women to further coordinate and collaborate through their respective bureaux on the issue of older women within the framework of their respective multi-year programmes of work;