He builds self-sustaining communities in Zimbabwe — and Victoria just named him Senior of the Year

Mark Edmonds spends his volunteering life on a long-distance act of neighbourliness: helping build self-sustaining communities in Zimbabwe. This month at Government House in Melbourne, that work won him the Premier's Award for Victorian Senior of the Year 2026. He was honoured alongside sixteen older Victorians, among them Sandra Verdam, who founded Memory Care Cafés supporting people with dementia and their carers, and Margaret Jager, recognised for more than forty years of service to female veterans. The awards' shared message is simple: contribution does not retire.

Mechanism: community action