Age International submission to the IDC inquiry on the future of UK aid and development assistance

November 2025

1. Age International focuses on improving the lives of older people in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). Age International is a subsidiary of Age UK, a member of the HelpAge International (HAI) global network and a member of the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC). Our mission is to help older people around the world overcome poverty, claim their rights and challenge discrimination, so they can lead dignified, secure, active, and healthy lives.
2. At a time when the UK’s reputation on international development is at risk of being undermined by aid cuts, it is essential to prioritise an intersectional and life course approach, that leaves no one behind[1]. Such an approach must be based on genuine respect for, and partnership with, the global South, and a focus on those who are most at risk of poverty, marginalisation and exclusion.

How should the Government be prioritising UK Official Development Assistance in the coming years?

Context

3. The world is ageing rapidly as people are living longer. Between 2015 and 2050, the proportion of the world’s population aged over 60 will nearly double, from 12% to 22%. The number of persons aged 80 years or older is expected to triple between 2020 and 2050, to reach 426 million and the vast majority will live in LMICs.[2] By 2050 1 in 5 people will be over 60 years.[3]
4. Population ageing is gendered. Globally, women currently constitute 61.7% of those aged 80 or over.[4] By 2050, 55% of the world’s 2 billion older people will be women.
5. Living longer does not necessarily mean living longer in good health. The prevalence of disability amongst those between the ages of 65 and 74 is 44.6%, which increases to 84.2% amongst those aged 85 or over.[5] 51% of people over the age of 60, globally, live with two or more health conditions, or ‘multimorbidity’, with rates higher in women compared to men.[6]
6. Nearly two-thirds of the 44.4 million people with dementia live in LMICs and by 2050 71% will live in LMICs.[7] NCDs have not received sufficient attention by international donors as globally only 2.3% of development assistance for health was spent on NCDs in 2023.[8] This is despite the scale of the disease burden, with NCDs contributing to 80% of all years lived with a disability globally and being responsible for 7 out of the 10 leading causes of death in 2021.[9]

Priorities

7. A life course and intersectional approach to development is necessary for how the UK channels and invests its ODA.[10] Global population ageing intersections with increasing pressure on global healthcare systems, the continued rollback of human rights and commitments to achieving gender equality, the corrosive effects of humanitarian crises, and the amplified effects of the climate crisis, disproportionately impacting those most at risk within LMICs.[11] A renewed focus on how these converging factors are affecting those who are most vulnerable across the life course is critical.
8. To address the rights and needs of those most at risk of marginalisation and poverty, Age International recommends that the Government must focus its efforts in the following areas:

8.1.               Securing the protection of the rights of all people in society by reinforcing the multilateral human rights framework and playing a leading role in the creation of a UN Convention on the Rights of Older Persons.

8.2.               Tackling gender inequality by ensuring that women and girls are not subjected to further discrimination and abuse in later life. The UK Government can play a pivotal role by integrating a clear focus on older women’s rights that is age and disability inclusive, and gender responsive in its international programmes, policy and diplomacy.

8.3.               Ensuring global health policies are fit for ageing societies, cost-effective and contribute to tackling health inequity. The Government must advocate with international partners to address the growing burden of NCDs.

8.4.               Firmly embedding the commitment to ‘Leave No-One Behind’ across all international development, humanitarian and climate crisis plans. As the Government seeks to strengthen its partnership with the Global South, and as the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals deadline approaches, now is the time to give greater recognition to the role older people play in society.

8.5.               Designing international development, humanitarian and climate crisis interventions with age, gender and disability in mind from the outset. The UK Government can strengthen its legacy on data disaggregation by ensuring its own, and partners’, programmes include sex, age and disability disaggregated data as part of their design and reporting. The Government can support the UN and international partners to continue the work started by the Titchfield City Group on Ageing to improve the collection and analysis of data on later life internationally.[12]

How does the UK’s delivery for a) development and b) humanitarian assistance need to adapt to the changing funding and values landscape?

9. The UK’s Humanitarian Framework commits the Government to prioritising humanitarian assistance for people in greatest need, while preventing future shocks and building resilience. It places a particular emphasis on social protection and coordination across sectors.[13]
10. Older people, especially older women, people with disabilities, and those who have been displaced, are overlooked in humanitarian responses and development work and HelpAge International highlights this[14]. The role older people play in their families and communities, and the demographic transformations happening across LMICs, need to be considered.
11. Older people’s experience of humanitarian response risks becoming a hidden crisis. Over 10 million older people face forced displacement worldwide, with 77% lacking regular income in emergencies. Humanitarian assessments often fail to collect data after the ages of 49 or 59, rendering invisible the challenges older people face.[15]
12. Cash-based assistance should be prioritised in development and humanitarian programming as it provides agency, autonomy and dignity to affected populations. The UK can support partner governments with technical assistance to improve their pension systems and to provide shock responsive and gender transformative social protection.[16] Globally, only 39.4% of the working age population are protected by pension law and receive old-age pensions from contributory schemes. This includes 46.3% of men and only 32.6% of women.[17] Under 20% of older people over the statutory retirement age of their country receive a pension.[18]
13. In both development and humanitarian assistance delivery, there is need for improved sex, age, and disability disaggregated data (SADD) to accurately measure and convey the inclusion of marginalised groups, including older people. The UK’s global influence, technical expertise, and commitment to humanitarian inclusion can drive forward social protection in a way that leaves no one behind and ensures local priorities are at the forefront of delivery.
14. Enabling a bottom-up approach to social protection, such as working with Older People’s Associations, builds future resilience and strengthens partner-led ways of working.[19] Older Citizen Monitoring (OCM) was developed by HelpAge International and piloted with funding from the former UK Department for International Development (DFID). Through OCMs, older people monitor the implementation of policies and services at grassroots level and communicate more directly with decision makers. In Bangladesh, OCM improved transparency in the allocation of social allowances at community level and helped women to take on leadership positions in citizen monitoring groups. This contributed to an increase in the national government’s Old Age Allowance budget.[20]

What needs to change to realise the goal of moving from paternalistic models and relationships to partnerships?

15. The changing international aid and development landscape amplifies the need for the FCDO to embrace funding models that enable greater collaboration between global, national and local structures. This offers an opportunity for the UK’s development work to be more partner-led but must be done in a way that is consistent, reliable, and equitable for partners.
16. An example of a new funding model is HelpAge International’s Healthy Ageing Platform that was launched in 2024. Seed funding from Age UK enabled the co-design of the platform with local partners. It is now supported by over 150 organisations from 60 countries.[21] The platform provides opportunities for grassroots and national organisations to learn from each other while influencing policy and practice related to healthy ageing. Through community grants designed to support their work improving health services for older people, local partners are empowered to influence and shape healthy ageing policies, systems, services and practices at community, national and international levels.