On Friday 22 December 2017 the Red Cross of Kragujevac marked the fifth anniversary of its Corner for Quality Ageing. This initiative is an example of good practice that promotes social inclusion of older people, healthy lifestyles, solidarity, volunteering and intergenerational solidarity.

The anniversary event was organised in the Congress Hall of the Kragujevac Town Assembly. GordanaDamnjanovic, member of the Town Council for Healthcare and Social Welfare congratulated the Red Cross of Kragujevac on the anniversary and spoke about the significance of the Corner, expressing hope that this example of good practice can be replicated in other towns and municipalities in Serbia as community services are very important in prevention of loneliness.

The representative of the Red Cross of Serbia Natasa Todorovic underlined that, in addition to its regular activities, the Corner also represents an advocacy platform for improvement of quality of life of older people at local, national and global level. The activities of the Corner support vulnerable older persons but also promote positive image of ageing and older people. Also, the Corner promotes lifelong learning, knowledge and experience, which are very important for healthy and active ageing.

The event was also used as an opportunity for the Red Cross of Kragujevac to award the first „drDesankaBrankovićMilosavljević“ accolade to the volunteer MilkaIgnjatovic who has been an active volunteer for 30 years and donated 20,000 hours of her work to those who needed help the most.

The event was also attended by representatives of the Red Cross of Montenegro and Dignitas Network from Montenegro, as well as the representatives of the Red Cross of Macedonia, Association Humanity and InkluzivaM Network from Macedonia. These partners of the Red Cross of Serbia in the Taking Action on Social Inclusion of Older People project then visited the Red Cross of Kragujevac and were presented the organisation’s activities for older people: self-help groups, telephone assistance, Corner for Quality Ageing, Working Village Weekend, Telephone Circle, Food distribution. This visit was part of the planned peer visits in the Taking Action on Social Inclusion of Older People project funded by European Union, Austrian Development Agency and Austrian Red Cross.