Foreign envoys, industry experts and local VIPs participated in a panel discussion on the current trends and future challenges of retiring in Asia at the latest in the continuing luncheon lecture series run by Asia Society’s Korea Center at a hotel in Seoul on Tuesday.

For the vast majority of Indians, retirement does not involve IRAs or pension schemes, according to Shashi Maudgal, president of Novelis Asia and chairman of Indian Chamber of Commerce in Korea. It is a family affair.

“If you asked an Indian man 30 years ago what his retirement plan is he would say, ‘son number 1 and son number 2. That is my pension plan,’” he explained.

In this way, there are really two Indias for every subject, Maudgal said. “10 percent of India is globally integrated, highly educated and is the driver of the Indian economy today” and the rest is the India that “is tagging along.”

The labor force of the first India consists of about 30 million people. The vast majority ― some 460 million ― belong to latter group.

Maudgal was one of three panelists, including Takuya Sasayama of the Japanese Embassy and Park Jin-ho, head of corporate pension at Kyobo Life, who drew a picture of growing old and retirement in Asia. Foreign envoys from Belarus, Romania, Japan, Ecuador, Costa Rica were in attendance.

Sasayama drew a picture of Japan’s growing population of seniors, citizens 65 years old and above. About 32 million people ― some 25 percent of the population ― was 65 years of age or older in 2013, according to the Japanese government. One in 3 Japanese will be a senior by 2035.

Sasayama said the economic policies of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe aimed to address some of the long-term effects of this massive demographic challenge, such as raising the consumption tax, reforming the health system and retaining seniors in the labor force.

Asia Society started in 1956 as a nonprofit organization focused on increasing awareness and knowledge about Asia in the United States. It has five offices in the United States and six in Asia, including the Korea Center, which opened in April 2008.

By Philip Iglauer (ephilip2011@heraldcorp.com)