Mengyin explores new volunteer‑service model for rural elderly‑care support

Mengyin County has rolled out multi‑pronged practices to innovate volunteer services for rural elderly residents. Facing prominent aging‑population pressure in mountain villages, the county integrates party‑member volunteers, new‑social‑stratum practitioners, village‑level grassroots cadres and social‑work professionals, building a multi‑dimensional rural senior‑care volunteer‑service system.

Local authorities sort out detailed files for elderly groups including empty‑nest seniors, low‑income aged people and seniors with disabilities. Volunteer teams carry out classified and targeted home‑based services. Services cover routine home safety inspections, daily‑life assistance, health‑check accompaniment, psychological comfort, mobile‑phone digital‑skill guidance and festival condolence visits.

Multiple innovative working mechanisms are put in place. The “volunteer pairing with elderly households” system achieves one‑to‑one regular contact. Village‑level volunteer service stations are built at grassroots cultural‑activity centers. Meanwhile, Mengyin links township‑level hospitals, clinics and volunteer teams to deliver combined medical‑care and volunteer services for rural seniors.

In addition to door‑to‑door home visits, the county organizes centralized public‑welfare activities at village squares: free clinics for the elderly, lectures on senior health‑preservation, anti‑fraud popularization targeting aged groups and recreational cultural events. These activities enrich spiritual and cultural life of rural elderly residents.

Mengyin keeps optimizing incentive and management rules for volunteers, encouraging more social forces to take part in rural senior‑care undertakings. The practice is designed to make up shortages of formal aged‑care resources in mountainous countryside and enhance elderly residents’sense of security and happiness.

Editor：韩蒙蒙