Role of HelpAge Canada in the funding ecosystem
HelpAge Canada is a national registered charity and international NGO dedicated to improving the lives of older adults in Canada and around the world. Founded in 1975, the organization works as both a backbone for community-based seniors’ services (CBSS) and a bridge between grassroots realities and systems-level change. A central part of its role is to raise and deliver flexible funding to local community organizations that support older people facing poverty, isolation, abuse, and barriers to essential services.
In Canada, HelpAge Canada’s flagship granting program is Age Better, which provides flexible grants of up to $20,000 to senior-serving community organizations. These grants fund local programs that promote social connection, well-being and equity, with a focus on reducing loneliness, combating ageism, and enhancing dignity for older adults. The program includes themed streams such as Ageing Connected, which supports initiatives that eliminate loneliness and build social connections, and Ageing Boldly, which addresses ageism, abuse and neglect.
Publics accompanied and overall impact
Age Better grants are targeted to community-based nonprofits and CBSS organizations across provinces and territories. Since 2020, the program has supported more than 10,000 older adults in over 65 communities. Grantees include a wide range of seniors’ centres, intercultural community services, faith and Indigenous organizations, elder abuse prevention networks, and university-based research initiatives. Beyond grants, HelpAge Canada convenes a shared community of practice, fostering peer learning and collaboration among funded partners.
Beyond domestic granting, HelpAge Canada engages internationally through its GrandConnect program and partnerships with HelpAge International and Global Affairs Canada. It supports older people in multiple countries through humanitarian response in crises and long-term community development rooted in human rights, community care and local leadership. Funding mobilized from Canadian donors and institutional partners is channelled to local organizations and networks that directly serve vulnerable older adults.
Partnerships, platforms and systems change
HelpAge Canada plays a strategic convening role within the CBSS sector. It helps strengthen the sector through cross-community coordination, consultations across Canada, and national summits that bring together hundreds of practitioners and leaders. The organization also stewards CORE Canada, a national digital hub and newsletter that shares tools, resources, funding opportunities and events for people working and volunteering in community-based seniors’ services.
Through these combined funding and convening activities, HelpAge Canada seeks to advance ageing equity, influence public policy, and ensure that older people’s voices shape the programs and systems that affect their lives. The charity emphasizes financial transparency, reporting that a large majority of donated funds go directly to programs, and situates its grantmaking within a broader agenda of rights-based, inclusive and dignified ageing.
