Taking stock of age-friendly cities in Aotearoa New Zealand: Progress, pitfalls and pathways towards healthy ageing
Annear M, Hyde C. 2025. Taking stock of age-friendly cities in Aotearoa New Zealand: Progress, pitfalss and pathways towards healthy ageing. Australasian Journal of Ageing 44:e70058. doi: 10.1111/ajag.70058
Cities across Aotearoa New Zealand are undergoing rapid demographic transi-tions towards super-aged communities. Such changes necessitate innovations tosupport healthy ageing that incorporate social and environmental developmentsin addition to health service improvements. The World Health Organization (WHO) Age- Friendly Cities (AFC) framework and global network provide guid-ance and pathways to enhance livability and well-being for ageing societies. NewZealand's engagement with the WHO AFC network has been both recent and in-consistent, with only seven municipalities formally participating since 2018, andlimited uptake among larger population centres. Drawing on published actionplans and evaluation reports at city and district level, demographic trend dataat national and sub- national scale, and government and WHO policy and proce-dural documents, this paper critically examines the progress and challenges as-sociated with AFC initiatives in New Zealand since 2018. While there is evidenceof gradual increases in AFC commitment at both national and local level in NewZealand, including growth of a local proxy network, significant gaps and limi-tations remain with engagement and implementation. Five key challenges areidentified, including the lack of operationalisation and measurement of indica-tors of AFC development and success, overreliance on implementation partners,a lack of sustainable funding commitments, limited support for community advo-cates and volunteers, and challenges engaging cities and districts in the context ofcompeting urban design frameworks. Actionable recommendations are proposedto strengthen AFC development, including improved integration of AFC princi-ples in urban planning, formalised key performance indicators, and enhancedsupport for community champions.
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