THE UNITED STATES VIRGIN ISLANDS and Puerto Rico are among the world's fastest ageing populations.

The two countries were in the top25 per cent of countries with people over60 years old. Seventy per cent of the population in both countries is over 60.

Karoline Schmid, social affairs officer of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) revealedthis at the 12th regional meeting on Ageing, Social Protection and Disaster Risk Reduction at Barbados Beach Village yesterday.

Barbados has found its way on the statistics as part of the first 50 per cent of ageing populations. Cuba, the Netherlands, Trinidad and Tobago, St Vincent, Jamaica, St Lucia and Suriname are also inthat demographic.

Japan is in lead with about a third ofits population over 60 years old.

The survey was conducted in 183 member states of the United Nations.

But while those statistics may seem staggering, chief executive officer of Help Age International (HAI) Richard Blewitt said ageing was a "great global success".

"It's a success of development, it's a success of the world and the state of the world....A lot of people start to view ageing as a problem, as a cost, as something they need to worry about, rather than actually seeing it as a resource and as a success of the development process that we've all been in," Blewitt noted.

He said that despite the "significant development progress" that had been made in the Caribbean with regard to the ageing, there was still a disproportionate number of older people affected by higher levels of poverty.

(YB)