2026 Commentary: China's Silver Economy Reaches Nearly RMB 10 Trillion, 10% of GDP

The outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan calls for vigorous development of the silver economy, enriching the supply of elder-friendly products and elderly care services, and nurturing leading enterprises and established brands. Driving the expansion and quality improvement of elderly care products and services through consumption upgrading has become a key agenda. Pension finance, smart health care, elderly education, and residential elderly care are emerging as important growth engines of the silver economy.

The silver economy still faces practical challenges. Product homogeneity is pronounced, with many elderly care services and elder-friendly products lacking differentiated competitiveness. Some capital has speculated on "high-end" concepts or even resorted to fraud, damaging the market environment. The supply-demand gap for professional talent is acute: traditional caregiving-oriented training models are struggling to adapt to emerging formats such as integrated medical and elderly care and smart health care. The construction of elder-friendly scenarios lags behind, with a huge gap between supply and demand in elderly education and insufficient companion care services in communities and elderly care institutions. Financial product terms remain opaque, and the payment guarantee system is not yet fully established.

In response, various regions have launched practical experiments. Hejin City in Shanxi Province has introduced a three-colour window-paper classification mechanism, with red marking key monitored households, yellow marking routine care households, and blue marking healthy and active households, enabling precise classification and targeted policy implementation in elderly care services. Wuxi City in Jiangsu Province has issued a rating method for home-based elderly care institutions, with grades ranging from A to 5A, driving quality upgrades in elderly care services. The Weiyang District Comprehensive Elderly Care Centre in Xi'an is equipped with smart mattresses that monitor health indicators and AI voice devices with one-touch emergency calling. Fuzhou City in Jiangxi Province has built an "order, assign, dispatch, evaluate" mechanism, allowing seniors to book housekeeping, meal assistance, and companion care services through a mini-programme or hotline, with low-income and disabled seniors receiving government-guaranteed support.