Opens the forum and sets the framing for the two days, showcasing the SEF 2026 theme of healthy longevity as an engine of economic growth, set in the context of ASEAN leadership.

Frames aging as a competition for advantage rather than a shared burden. The countries that build silver economy infrastructure (financial products, care systems, urban design, workforce policy) over the next five years will create the template for everyone else. Draws on best practices from across the region, new demographic data, capital flow analysis, and on-the-ground policy evidence.

Brings a senior business leader’s perspectives on key indicators of healthy aging, through a regional lens, spotlighting key priorities for silver economy growth, including women’s health, cardiovascular disease prevention, and the importance of ongoing investment in scientific innovation applicable to 21st century age demography.

Today’s challenges include pension systems built for a different era; labor markets built around careers that no longer exist; rising intergenerational tension. This panel asks what a revised social contract actually requires, who are the visionaries making changes currently, and who has the political will to build it. Anchored by new research on depopulation and aging societies from the World Demographic Association.

A closer look at GCOA and BBC Storyworks' Age-Reimagined content series: the stories it spotlights, the difference it’s making, and how media narratives can improve public expectations of aging. Explores the essential nature of powerful storytelling to showcase opportunities for both doing good (philanthropic) and doing well (business) in the aging sector.

Examines China's approach to scaling interventions for healthy aging: preventive care, elder care services, insurance and financial products, and housing-plus-care retirement models. A stable policy environment is opening market opportunities for silver economy businesses serving 400 million older people, extending healthy years and contributing to growth.

Commercial responses to healthy longevity have matured past lifestyle products. Institutional investors are building longevity portfolios, consumer companies are redesigning for the 60-plus market at scale, and sovereign wealth funds are treating aging infrastructure as long-term national investment. Explores tangible actions as well as identifies motivations that have accelerated these significant long-term investments.

Older travelers are spending more, traveling longer, and reshaping an industry built for a younger customer. Examines how accessibility tools, social engagement, smarter booking, design decisions and on-trip health monitoring are changing what airlines, hospitality companies, and tourism boards need to build for this market, and what the data on travel and healthy longevity is starting to show about return on investment.

The forum's formal host country welcome, opening a day centered on Malaysian leadership and regional policy delivery.

Recognizes a company, researcher, or initiative delivering measurable progress in healthy longevity or the silver economy.

Leading Japanese health policy makers will discuss how Japan is reforming health policy to meet their super aging needs and how their changes might be a model for other aging societies.

Makes the economic and public health case for shifting from treating disease to preventing it, building directly on the host country welcome. Grounded in AP-CHAAI's work on adult vaccination across the region, with countries like Australia identifying distinct approaches. Panelists cover how vaccines, early diagnostics, and longevity research cut long-term healthcare costs and help governments build more sustainable health systems.

What it takes to make a capital city work for older residents: housing, transit, public space, and services designed for every age. The conversation covers the Federal Territories agenda and the opportunity for Kuala Lumpur to set the regional standard for age-friendly urban development.

Treats age-inclusive design as economic infrastructure: walkable cities, age-inclusive workplaces, and productivity tools that keep older workers contributing. Japan's community health and transportation partnerships offer a working example, where mobility decline quickly becomes a health issue through missed appointments, isolation, and lost independence. Cities, developers and employers that invest now outperform those that don't.

Women live longer and retire with less, and legal systems built for shorter lives leave gaps in fraud protection, guardianship, inheritance, and retirement planning. Panelists examine what's been built since SEF last gathered, where the law needs to catch up, and what commitments need to be made across Malaysia and the region.

Covers the science shaping healthy longevity, from precision therapies and next-generation flu vaccines to cardiovascular and brain health, alongside advances in aging research disciplines such as dermatology, and how prevention and collaboration are reshaping aging societies.

ASEAN will need millions more care workers than its demography can supply, and no country can hire its way out. Panelists examine where AI and assistive technology are already substituting for scarce labor (diagnostics, remote monitoring, caregiving support, financial planning), where public policy is lagging on risk and access, and how the private sector can scale these tools without leaving older adults behind.

The UN Decade of Healthy Ageing ends in 2030 alongside the SDGs, and Kuala Lumpur is one of the last major convenings before the final stretch. Records which ASEAN signatories, and others, commit to carrying the work forward.