Cáritas Coimbra discussed the implementation of Sustainable Places | Pharaon & SHAFE

Cáritas Coimbra, represented by the Innovation Director, Carina Dantas, participated on October30^th in the workshop “Sustainable Housing Supporting Health and Well-being”, on the 4^th day of the digital conference “Sustainable Places 2020”.

This workshop brought together a set of initiatives supported by the European Union (EU), which are drawing up innovative solutions to support the development and investment in sustainable housing, thus, enhancing the health and well-being of EU’s citizens.

Project representatives presented their research and jointly discussed and evaluated the potential challenges they face.

Carina Dantas presented “Smart, Healthy and Age-Friendly Environments – Policies and Implementation” and how the SHAFE concept has been implemented in the Portuguese pilot of Pharaon, and also in several other ongoing international projects such as Net4Agefriendly, Hands-on-SHAFE, Smartwork , EU_SHAFE, and national projects: ACTIVAS and CR55+. 

The concept was created in 2017, fuelled by the desire to implement Smart, Healthy and Age-Friendly Environments (SHAFE) across Europe, by promoting the link between health, social support, information technologies (ICT) and built environments. In 2020, this Stakeholder Network released a Position Paper with recommendations on healthier, accessible and sustainable environments for all with the support of ICT. A Portuguese Smart, Healthy and Age-Friendly Environments Network (SHAFE) was also created and it currently involves more than 70 member organizations. This conference was an opportunity to also disseminate the Portuguese Network, with the same objective, that brings together a wide range of Portuguese organizations committed to the promotion of a joint agenda for the implementation of Inclusive Environments for all ages, with particular emphasis in the areas of Health, Social Support, TICE and Infrastructures. Led by Cáritas Coimbra and Coimbra Nursing School, it is also supported by an extensive Advisory Board of relevant national-wide opinion leaders and it is integrated in ECHAlliance network of ecosystems.

Silvia Urra (TECNALIA) chaired the conference departing from the experience of the Homes4Life project, of which she is Coordinator and Cáritas Coimbra is a member of the Advisory Board. Homes4Life is a European Commission’Coordination and Support Action that aims to create a certification system for smart homes. On the panel there were also the introduction and final presentations by Irina Kalderon-Libal, Policy Officer of DG CNECT – European Commission. Filippo Cavallo and Charalampos Vassiliou got deeper into the projects they coordinate, Pharaon and Smartwork, respectively.