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As I approached the village there was a chicken picking in the grass and a goat fastened to a pole. I shouted hello or "oddi" to children coming out of a nearby house, and enquired if their parents were in. "They are out in the working in the fields," they replied, "but our grandmother is here." They brought me to a shaded place behind the house where an old woman was sitting peeling some maize cobs. She was thin, her face wrinkled, and she looked very old. She smiled and told the children to bring me a chair, offering me some newly fried maize. This describes a typical traditional setting in Zambia, where the elders move in with their children when they are too old to care for themselves.

Zambia is in southern Africa, and most of the population live below the poverty line. Aging is an inevitable part of life in the West, but this is not always the case in countries like Zambia where life expectancy is about 44 years, and fewer than 5% of the 9.5 million people reach the age of 65. It's estimated that around 25% of Zambians of reproductive age in urban areas are either HIV positive or have AIDS. This has serious implications for the family because the elders rarely have the financial means to support their families.

Old and valued

Urbanisation has led to an expansion of cities and crowded suburbs, especially in poor areas. The water supply is limited in some suburbs, and people have to queue for an hour just to fill one bucket. In rural areas, villages often consist of a couple of home made mud huts with grass roofs. Some villages don't have a well, and people often have to travel a few kilometres to find the nearest source of water.

Despite these difficulties, people seem to care for each other more than in developed countries. The extended family includes parents, siblings, nieces, and nephews. Everyone is taught from an early age to look after family members and other people in the community. When parents become older, or when a partner dies, the children or grandchildren take care of them. It is considered the norm in both social and financial terms to fully include elderly people in the extended family.

Retired people often move from the city back to their villages, where they have a high status, owing to their work and life experiences. They can also cultivate a piece of land, while getting away from the stress and greater expense associated with city life. People who reach old age are considered to be wise, and their status in society rises with age. The family look to their elders for advice, and these are metaphorically seen as a big tree under which the younger people seek refuge. Many cultural practices involve the elders. For instance, the elders instruct young girls and boys on adult responsibilities during ceremonies marking their passage into adulthood. The elders also act as counsellors to couples with marital problems, and generally take on the role of raising the grandchildren in the extended family.

In Western countries like Sweden, where I have been living for several years, elderly people are often associated with low socio-economic status. Their pension may be insufficient to live on, and they may require social benefits to help them survive. Newspapers carry stories about how lonely and frightened the elderly are.

By contrast to the typical Western response to aging, it is culturally unacceptable for people in Zambia to refuse to care for their elders, and even when they become sick or difficult to manage, the children and grandchildren believe it is their duty to care for them. This can mean juggling work, family life, and caring for a dependent elderly person all at the same time. A woman I know had to get up every morning at 4.00 am to wash and feed her mother who had suffered a stroke, then get her children ready for school and be at work by 8.00 am. The mother spent the day in the living room so she was not alone. I admire this woman. Her response, however is: "My mother did the same for me when I was young, why would I not do that for her now?"

If your mother suffers a stroke in Sweden, she will probably end up in a residential rehabilitation unit. Most of the elders whose health is poor end up in homes like these. This relieves children from the burden of caring for elderly parents but is this the quality of life that they deserve? In my view, the elders are victims of industrialisation because in preindustrial times, they were taken care of by their children even in the West.

There are a few homes for the elderly in Zambia, and these only opened when the former British colonialists reached an age where they needed care. Even today the few homes that exist have mostly non-Zambian residents. Development has its drawbacks because everyone is expected to be productive and when no longer wanted by society, they are "put away."

Care in the community works in Zambia

Poverty is the greatest barrier to reaching old age in countries like Zambia but if people do survive, the quality of life in terms of social acceptance and status is much higher than in Western countries. I believe that the West has a lot to learn from the Zambian experience--I have no doubt which system I would prefer when I reach old age.