HKSGV Sustainable Healthcare Conference
10/12/2018
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Image: HKIUD
I was pleased to be able to support our HKIUD President Joel Chan, and other experts in “Co-Creating a Healthy Community for Hong Kong’s Ageing Population” conference held by Hong Kong Shared Good Values. 

This conference, was part of HKSGV’s 2018 key healthcare initiative, centering on private-public partnerships, urban design guidelines and community participation that are crucial to sustainable healthcare development in Hong Kong. 
Barriers and affordances are critical to elderly mobility. Video: SINCLAIR
Elderly community is a normal community. Video: SINCLAIR.
The panel session


During the panel session, I was able to work with Mr. Laurence Liauw ​(Director, SPADA and Spada Health Concepts) to facilitate the discussion.  
This session sought major stakeholders’ opinions, established an on-going dialogue and generated a clear framework for the undertaking ideas which aim to improve Hong Kong’s physical urban environment to facilitate “active ageing”. Two guiding principles identified in this panel included building “inclusive” environment and building environments that facilitate “active ageing”.
​Earlier in June 2018, the Hong Kong Institute of Urban Design (HKIUD) organised an international conference which initiated in-depth discussions among international experts, experienced policymakers and development leaders on the major deficiencies our urban environment entails when it comes to address needs of a rapidly aging society. This session was an extension of HKIUD’s June initiative, where it asked participants questions relating to urban environment improvement based on survey findings that HKIUD collected in June. The objective of these questions were identify the major areas which Hong Kong should tackle first when preparing and improving our physical urban environment for the aged.
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Image:HKIUD
​When participants were asked “What do you consider to be most important for elderly to be happy and well?”, most respondents thought staying active for better health and accessibility to different places in the community are most important. Regarding response to the question “What makes an elderly-friendly urban environment?”, most participants thought that inclusiveness in urban planning was essential since the elderly needs more opportunities to integrate into the society.
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Image: HKIUD
In order to reconfirm the importance of urban design to addressing ageing needs the community a deeper understanding, HKIUD also raised four more online questions during the session. Over 40 participants completed the online questionnaire. The polling results are the foundations on which HKIUD will develop urban design guidelines for Hong Kong’s ageing population in the coming year.  

Survey Results

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Image: HKIUD

Question 1a) “Are you aware of the importance of urban design in active ageing?”

  • Over 90 percent of the audience were aware of the importance of urban design in active ageing. Among the 90 percent, 60 percent thought urban design is very important for active ageing.

Question 1b) “Are you aware of the importance of urban design in health care?

  • Nearly 90 percent of the audience thought that urban design is important in healthcare. Among the 90 percent, over 40 percent of the audience thought it is very important

Question 2) “Should health and wellness form a significant motivation of urban design guidelines in active ageing?”

  • Over 90 percent of the audience thought health and wellness should be a major guiding principle (significant motivation) of urban design guidelines in active ageing.    

Question 3) “Who should be involved in formulating the urban design guidelines?”

  • Respondents thought the top three parties that should be involved in formulating urban design guidelines should be 1) public developers; 2) government departments; and 3) healthcare sector players.

Question 4) “How could you be involved in formulating the urban design guidelines?”

  • The top three methods respondents thought would best facilitate their involvement in the formulating the urban design guidelines are 1) engagement workshop in the initial stage; 2) online survey; 3) engagement workshop in the final stage.  
Inspired by two Harvard Business School Professors, Porter and Kramer's idea of Creating Shared Value, Hong Kong Shared Good Values Movement (HKSGV) brings together the best minds from businesses, academia, social enterprises, NGOs, and the Government to instigate innovative ideas and collaborative actions to advance Hong Kong's sustainable socio-economic growth.