Waseda Statement
The APEC Workshop
September 14th, 2012
Tokyo, Japan
The APEC workshop “Information Communication Technology (ICT) Applications for People with Special
Needs (especially the elderly and people with disabilities)” was held in conjunction with the OECD
workshop “Anticipating the Special Needs of the 21st Century Silver/Ageing Economy: Smart
Technologies and Services Innovation” on September 12th-14th, 2012 by Waseda University, Tokyo,
Japan.
The workshop was organized in order to emphasize the role of ICT in solving the problems of
ageing societies, and how people with special needs can leverage infocomm technologies to
enrich their lives through innovation in various fields, such as healthcare and telework. The
workshop also analyzed case studies from APEC economies and international organizations,
draw experience from best practices, and discussed how to create the balance between
innovation policies and targeted measures, e.g. capacity building and public-private
partnership. On the basis of this work, the workshop recommended the enabling frameworks
and policies to promote ICT applications in the silver economy.
The workshop also provided an arena for government leaders, academics, private sector
executives and other stakeholders in the field of ICT innovation for people with special needs to
share their vision, experiences, ideas and lessons learned. The APEC workshop attracted about
450 participants from 43 economies and countries to discuss ICT innovation, for the silver
economy and people with special needs.
The high quality presentations given by representatives from academia, industry practitioners,
private sectors and governments during the 3-day joint workshops showed the latest research
and development on the following issues:
1. Silver Economy: opportunities and challenges
2. Public-Private Partnership (PPP) and social entrepreneurship
3. Financing innovation for the ageing society
4. ICT applications, service innovation and the ageing society
5. Age-friendly cities network and smart communities
6. Building resilience and preparedness for emergencies in the silver society
7. Capacity building
8. The new role of universities in the ageing society
9. The role of NGOs & VWOs in supporting people with special needs
The workshop recommended that governments put in place a comprehensive long-term growth
strategy that supports greater inclusiveness in our societies and seeks to raise our growth
potential through innovation and a knowledge-based economy. These three days of productive
discussions and exchange of ideas, allowed members and participants to endorse the following
agenda and propose further actions as follows:
Silver Economy: Challenges and Opportunities
It is undeniable that ageing population poses challenges for public health care, pension funding, and
labor shortages, among other areas. On the other hand, the ageing population also offers opportunities
for business and spurs innovation. The wealthier seniors (compared to their predecessors) create a
potential market for a silver economy. Moreover, the higher education level of future retirees may lead
to increasing demands for high quality services. The Workshop concluded with:
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The participants of the workshop agreeing on the emergence of a new business
area with enormous growth potential.
Many speakers emphasizing that instead of solely focusing on the challenges posed
by an ageing workforce, the business opportunities it creates should not be
overlooked.
The participants recognizing the importance of ICT innovation in the silver economy.
ICT is driving the further development of a robust and innovative global economy.
The participants recognizing that co-operation and integration of ICT application
development for the ageing societies can lead to shared benefits and encourage
general economic and social growth in APEC.
ICT Applications for Ageing Society
As highlighted above, ICT can enable service innovation in order to lower medical care cost,
acquire more accurate healthcare information and improve the quality of education,
transportation, and urban development for the elderly and disabled people. The workshop
discussed the advantages as well as the challenges of some popular ICT applications including
Smart Home, Telemedicine and Robotic Aids, and establishment of smart communities or agedfriendly cities.
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
Telemedicine
o
Telemedicine refers to the exchange of medical information through electronic
communication allowing remote healthcare. Telemedicine offers the possibility of
increasing the physical and emotional well-being of older people and allowing them to
remain at home. Thus, ICT’s enabling role in the use of communications technology in
clinical and non-clinical services will enhance service accessibility and delivery.
o
Some of the latest technological developments with the utilization of ICT from APEC
member economies like Japan and others with high standards as well as affordable
conditions could help clinical healthcare services to overcome the challenge of physical
distance. It creates an environment where the communication patient and medical
staff can interact as if they are in the same room. It allows the physicians to “visit” or
“counsel” patients, particularly those with impaired mobility, minimizing the need for
travel, which also benefits the elderly who live in rural areas. APEC economies are
encouraged to work together to improve cooperation in the area of telemedicine.
Smart Home

o
A “Smart Home” refers to an innovative concept that integrates technology with
residents in order to maintain and even enhance the quality of life, functional health,
security and safety. A Smart Home can organize and control most of the devices and
appliances in the house through the use of a cell phone or a TV in a network in order to
create a safe and secure environment especially for the elderly. Moreover, it can also
act as a disaster prevention network, which is a very important feature since the
majority of the victims from disaster are the elderly. For example, the Earthquake Early
Warning System warns the residents via a message on the TV screen while
automatically cutting off all gas in the house, and provide alerts on health conditions
(such as heart rate, blood pressure and blood glucose level of the resident) to medical
staff.
o
Smart home technology has both social and economic benefits. While manufacturers
and implementers of such advanced technologies will gain economic benefit, people
with special needs will also benefit from consuming such products and service to
enhance their lives. The APEC economies should coordinate efforts to achieve
maximum gains.
Robotic Aids
o The development of robotic assistance systems may empower a greater possibility
for elderly patients to stay at home especially those with mobile limitations caused
by chronic conditions. Presently, Japan is maximizing its efforts to develop robots
that can care for the elderly and those with reduced mobility. One example is the
Global Robot Academia at Waseda University. Over the years Waseda University has
developed a family of robots based on the principle that people and robots can coexist, with the potential to enable older adults to maintain independence with
robotic assistance.
o The population of APEC economies is ageing (particularly Japan and South Korea). To
cope with such a situation, APEC members should introduce a nationwide system of
robotic assistive technologies for elderly care and invest in the development of such
services and healthcare robots. As Japan is an initiator of robotic assistive
technologies in APEC, Japan’s nationwide system of robotic assistive technologies
can be an example of best-practices for the other APEC economies.
o In the near future, APEC members should establish a center for developing and
coordinating the nationwide systems of robotic assistive technologies (e.g. Japan).

Smart Communities and Aged-friendly Cities
o Smart communities or aged-friendly cities are characterized with special
infrastructure and activities for supporting interrelationships between government
and ageing population. These special infrastructure and activities refer to the
provision of essential services and assistance to the ageing population. During the
workshop we have learned experiences from Australia, Japan, US, UK, Thailand, and
other countries on how to develop aged-friendly cities.
o Further development of smart communities or aged-friendly cities needs more
recommendations. One of which is to form a special government agency – e.g.
Ministry for Ageing population or Ministry in charge - so that the government can
eliminate barriers to develop aged-friendly cities. Bilateral or multi-lateral cooperations among the ongoing smart city projects are encouraged to share best
practices on some common initiatives as well as to strengthen the targeted
community development.
o Another recommended activity is celebrating the Day of Older People to encourage
the young generation to preserve traditional customs (such as showing respect to
the seniors), and governments to take greater care of older people. These activities
may contribute toward increasing the moral aspects of society which are necessary
for elderly people to feel appreciated and happier.
o Promote an active digital lifestyle according to the needs of the respective groups
such as encouraging seniors to use ICT to connect with family and friends,
introducing bonding activities such as, Intergenerational IT Bootcamp for young
people to interact with the elderly, and growing a senior volunteers’ community for
the seniors to help the elderly.
Collaboration with OECD and other international organizations
The collaboration between government and the private sector through PPP is necessary to
solve the problems of ageing societies. Joint efforts can be beneficial to government, business
and citizens as a new type of Smart Community. To accomplish this goal, it is necessary to
analyze the existing collaboration schemes and modify them if necessary in order to make them
more efficient. The participants of the workshop also recommended the following measures in
order to increase the quality and efficiency of collaboration.

This join workshop of OECD and APEC is the starting point to extend and enhance the cooperation between two organizations in this field in the future.

Establish an agency (e.g. at ministry level) and appoint a Cabinet Minister in the
government in each APEC economy to be responsible for addressing the national issue of
people with special needs and coordinate the collaboration of different activities in the
countries.

Dedicate a National holiday (e.g. “People with Special Needs Day”) for the people with
special needs in the member countries and beyond. This day will be dedicated to them and
can be celebrated with events to demonstrate appreciation of contribution of people with
special needs.

Support and improve existing collaboration among academia, government, business sector,
international organizations, and other related parties with a view to rapidly develop ICT
applications in the ageing societies to overcome the worldwide economic and
environmental crises.

Develop a global network to analyze and monitor initiatives and efforts to promote and
adopt ICT in the global ageing society, with the collaboration among international
organizations such as APEC, ASEAN, ITU, OECD, IAC and the United Nations University that
can support the efforts towards building a better world.

Support the activities of APEC for creating indicators and benchmarking ICT applications for
ageing societies as a measurement model for evaluation. Particularly, to work jointly with
APEC e-Government Research Center located at Waseda University to develop the results of
“ICT applications for people with special needs” project which was funded by APEC into
prestigious international ranking framework.

Develop APEC R&D Center for Silver Economy and a Headquarter which can be located in
Japan because of Japan’s high potential in research and development, particularly in robotic
assist technologies for aging population. The collaboration between government and the
private sector through PPP is very important since the private sector can produce
technologies, products (technology-related) and services based on R&D results.
Capacity Building, Research and Education
At the workshop, the role of capacity building, research and education were highlighted as an
enabler to effectively deal with the challenges arising from ageing societies. While APEC
economies differ greatly in terms of the profile of elderly populations, the need for an action
plan to build the capacities for ICT use by the elderly and disabled people is not necessarily
different. For example, Japan has one of the highest proportions of elderly people in its
population, and thus has greater urgency to focus resources to support the ICT capabilities of
its elderly citizens than for other countries, which have a very young population. However, in
the future, the elderly population of other countries will be growing, and early action would
be beneficial in terms of the ICT literacy of future pensioners and retirees. By this statement,
we encourage APEC economies to consider developing ICT capabilities for elderly and
disabled people for the following reasons:

The digital divide exists in all countries and therefore lessons can be learned by
countries that are beginning to address this issue from those countries that are
already well on their way to addressing it. Thus, solutions should also be built jointly
through collaboration. A common framework is therefore needed to tackle the issue
at the APEC level.

Such capacity-building requires efforts from various participants, including the
caretakers and trainers of the elderly and disabled people, the national task force that
supports those caretakers and trainers, healthcare personnel and social workers,
government employees that are planning initiatives involving these groups, CIO
communities and APEC headquarters employees. The response should involve these
groups of people, and offer the required information, training, and resources to
achieve national and APEC-level objectives.

Support the research and development on ICT innovations that can provide possible
solutions to solve problems caused by economic and environmental crises, and the issue
of growing number of ageing citizens.

Universities have to play an active role in creating and sharing appropriate content with
the communities. In a worldwide context, the use of ICT to support seniors and disabled
people can benefit societies by reducing the associated costs for healthcare services.

Expand the activities carried out by UNESCO/UNITWIN (University Twining and
Networking) on distance education, as well as the APEC ICT HRD training scheme.

There is a shortage of the trainers (or educators) who can teach ICT to elderly people.
Thus, it is necessary to provide training courses for trainers who have background such
as educators, social workers, government officers, ICT experts and volunteers.

It is also important to commission a survey in order to understand the need of seniors
and to design relevant courses for both trainers and elderly people. There is also a need
to strengthen the development and implementation of the training model by supporting
the “International Accreditation Program” at the graduate level, preparing them to
handle different and unique conditions of countries where these programs are
implemented.

Organize international workshops as the ideal platform to exchange research outcomes
as well as best practices and to discuss future trends related to capacity building and the
role of ICT applications for people with special needs through the APEC scheme.

Create the global standards with universal design for the products and systems for
ageing and handicapped people with respect to accessibility, affordability and usability.
Finally, members and participants extended their full appreciation to the APEC Workshop
Organizing Committee of Waseda University chaired by Prof. Toshio Obi. Appreciation is also
extended to Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), the Japanese government
and International Academy of CIOs (IAC) which actively contributed and made the OECD-APECWaseda University-IDA joint workshops fruitful, constructive and successful.
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