Aging in Place in Low-Density Territories: Access to Health Care and Forest Management as Critical Factors Identified through Co-Research

Abstract

The accelerating pace of demographic aging and the growing concentration of older adult populations in low-density territories pose structural challenges to public health policy, territorial cohesion, and social participation. This article describes and analyzes the County Reporters 55+ (CR55+) project, developed in the municipality of Arganil, Portugal, using a co-research methodology designed to actively engage older adults in identifying unmet needs and collaboratively developing proposals for change in their residential communities. Fourteen volunteer co-researchers were recruited from three parishes within the municipality, with a mean age of 64.5 years and an equal gender distribution. The project was implemented across seven sequential stages, integrating training sessions in interviewing techniques and active listening, data collection through semi-structured interviews and photographic documentation, and collaborative analysis conducted in a focus group format over five sessions of approximately four hours each. Through a consensus-based process, the co-researchers identified four categories of unmet needs and problems: healthcare access and care; land and forest management and perceived wildfire risk; living in place and topophilia; and community empowerment, inclusion, and participation. The first two categories were prioritized and publicly presented to political and institutional decision-makers by spokespersons elected by the co-researchers themselves, marking the culmination of a deliberate process of power rebalancing between community residents and decision-making bodies. The findings are consistent with the national and international literature on the structural conditions of aging in place in low-density territories, and are grounded in the Portuguese constitutional normative framework and in European principles of territorial cohesion. The project demonstrated that co-research constitutes a valid, replicable, and low-cost approach to amplifying the voices of older populations, redressing power imbalances, and positioning older adults as active agents in shaping solutions for the communities in which they live and intend to age.