Plan now or ageing volunteer impact
Volunteering Tasmania has launched a project urging not-for-profit groups to plan now for the impact of the ageing population on volunteer workforces. Volunteering Tasmania asked demographer Natalie Jackson to map out the state’s future volunteer force.
Volunteering Tasmania has launched a project urging not-for-profit groups to plan now for the impact of the ageing population on volunteer workforces.
Volunteering Tasmania asked demographer Natalie Jackson to map out the state’s future volunteer force.
Chief executive of Volunteering Tasmania, Adrienne Picone, tells DPS News in 20 years almost a third of the volunteer workforce will be over 65 years.
“This is a first for Australia. We really need to know what’s going to be happening in the future so we can start to plan,” she says.
According to Ms Picone, there is concern for groups reliant on young fit workers.
Tasmania Fire Service’s Robyn Pearce says volunteer brigades are shrinking and ageing, but recruitment drives are slowly having an effect.
“In three of the four age groups under 45, we’ve had increases in the numbers.”
Volunteering Tasmania wants groups to contribute strategies for dealing with the ageing issue.
They will go into an action plan to be released later this year.
National Volunteers Week was celebrated recently. Click here to read DPS News’ story on 65-year-old Meals on Wheels volunteer Robin Cram.
