At Salamanca University we align past, present and future: a past of more than 800 years of promoting knowledge; a present focused on innovation and quality in teaching/learning, research, knowledge transfer and culture, with a clear international vocation; a future committed to and responsible for sustainable development.

Since Alfonso IX of León founded, more than eight centuries ago, the 'Scholas Salamanticae', the seed of the current University of Salamanca, a long and rich road has been travelled, in which numerous experiences of progress have been accumulated, in collaboration with its closest environment, with Europe and with Latin America. We are the oldest Spanish-speaking university and one of the oldest in Europe, the cradle of the law of nations, of the School of Salamanca which established the first modern economic theories, of the first grammar of Spanish and of the Gregorian calendar which governs our time. Over the years, the University of Salamanca has proved to be a destination and a starting point for those who are interested in knowledge.

It has a stable student body of around 30,000 students and has nine campuses to serve them, including 26 faculties and colleges and 12 centres that make up a broad and competitive structure of research units covering aspects as varied as biosciences and lasers, as well as agri-food developments, neurosciences, history studies and basic research, among others. These are joined by centres dedicated to strengthening academic and cultural links with other countries and cultures, such as the Spanish-Japanese Cultural Centre, the Centre for Brazilian Studies or the Institute of Latin American Studies, where the continuous movement of lecturers and students maintains links and creates new perspectives for the future in the alliances established.

It is also worth highlighting the work carried out by its General Foundation as an instrument of the University of Salamanca for channelling its institutional, business and social relations, being a primary and active agent in collaboration with the scientific, technological and business communities.

The International Centre on Aging is a positive response to a socio-demographic reality that has to face new challenges and opportunities. To this end, it promotes research programmes, encourages actions that favour a change in the perception of older people and develops training and information programmes. Its main mission is to consolidate itself as a centre of international reference by promoting research and innovation through leadership and the generation of knowledge.

It also promotes collaboration between business and academia with the intention of multiplying the benefits of public and private investment. It is time to change attitudes towards ageing, and instead of moving forward by improvising, to promote strategies on how best to optimise the additional decades of life that mankind's progress has achieved. In this way we can help people to live longer, more active and independent lives, and also contribute to making better use of the opportunities inherent in a rapidly changing society. For more information, please visit www.cenie.eu.

The General Foundation of the University of Salamanca (FGUSAL) acts as an interface organisation in the promotion and development of activities and projects to promote R&D&I. It carries out its activity through three directorates or departments: Directorate of Higher Education, Directorate of University-Business and Directorate of Offices Abroad. The areas of work of the University-Business Directorate, responsible for establishing stable links of collaboration between the university and companies, place special emphasis on those initiatives that promote the rapprochement between companies and technological supply and demand and support for innovation..

This Cooperation Programme addresses the most important cross-border challenges related to the implementation of the Europe 2020 strategy in the Spanish-Portuguese border region.

Thus, in the "smart growth" section, the Programme aims to strengthen the innovative capacity of the cross-border region and increase cooperation between SMEs, as well as research and development on both sides of the border. Likewise, in the search for territorial cohesion, the Programme aims to develop and improve cross-border public services and to increase citizens' identification with the border region of Spain and Portugal.

The Programme for a long-lived society wants to work with both Public Administrations and private initiative; with universities and research centres; with institutions representative of the social, economic, political, educational and cultural reality. With those industries and companies especially involved in the generation of products and services conducive to our transformational objective. With the technological world, from which many of the tools to be incorporated into our new population reality will come. Also with the media, whose work is decisive in the dissemination of the new concepts, of the new activities that, in favour of a more prosperous and innovative longevity, are developed in the world, as well as with all types of communication networks that, based on the impact made possible by the new media, expand the reality of the project in the widest and most intense way possible.

The project aims to be a field of experimentation for collaborative culture, for permanent dialogue between fundamental actors who are often isolated or unconnected. Only in this way will it be possible to achieve the objective we are aiming for, because efforts that are never known, that are barely perceptible, or actions based exclusively on good will, on activism that does not obey a reflexive planning or a constant and rigorous evaluation, are worthless.

The Programme for a long-lived society means investing in innovation. Creativity in the search for new answers. To assume the concept that animates the project is to become part of a transformation process in which the duration of life is accompanied by an extension in the quality of life.

And that process tolerates no delays.

The Management Committee of INTERREG V-A, Spain Portugal, (POCTEP), financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), at its meeting of 28/03/2019 in Madrid, agreed to grant ERDF assistance of 1,693,567.37 euros to the project Programme for a long-lived society (cód. 0551_PSL_6_E).