The ILS President and Secretary General attended Sportaccord Conference 2010 held in Dubai from 26-30 April.
There were 1,600 leaders from the International Sports Federations, Major Event Organisers, IOC Members, Sponsors and Media.
We attended the General Assemblies of the IWGA, the ARISF, the ASOIF and the GAIFS/Sportaccord.
We met with the World Games CEO and with the World Games Organising Committee for Cali, Columbia in 2013. We learned that due to a lack of beaches, the lifesaving competitions will only be organised in the swimming pool. We also met with the World Games Federation Board Members and requested our sport report that evaluated Lifesaving Sport in the 2009 World Games held in Kaohsiung ” Chinese Taipei. We met with the IOC Sports Director for our annual Lifesaving Sport review. All of these meetings were positive.
The Sportaccord Conference is a rich opportunity to attend to our statutory obligations for International Federations to attend General Assemblies for our International Sport Memberships. Sportaccord is also a very good time to learn, network and collaborate with other International Federations.
Sportaccord provides collaboration and connection opportunity with the support services for International Federations. We met with the representatives from Events South Australia, the hosts of Rescue 2012. We met with our potential ILS insurer, with an Interfuse representative and with many potential host nations and cities for ILS events.
The ILS President and ILS Secretary General did considerable advocacy for Lifesaving Sport with the IOC, Sportaccord, other International Federations, the International World Games Association, the National Olympic Committee of the Netherlands, the Commonwealth Games Federation, International University Sports Federation, the World Anti-Doping Association and many more.
We had a meeting with the International Canoe Federation (ICF) President concerning the Surf Ski being used in a World Championship event offered by the ICF. We have formally communicated to IOC President Dr. Jacques Rogge, with copies to the IOC Sports Director, IOC Member and ILS Knight Phil Coles, Sportaccord and ARISF and others about the ICF using Surf Ski in competition events that ILS believes to be our property.
We met with Sportaccord Beach Games organising group to advocate for the inclusion of Lifesaving Sport. Lifesaving Sport was not included in the list of “core sports for this new proposed multi-sport games programme. The startling omission was pointed out to the Sportaccord President and Staff by the ILS leadership and by many other international federations. We are expecting to be included in these multisport games when the host city is determined.
We enjoyed and learned about the culture, language and customs of Dubai and the United Arab Emirates. We were very privileged to have been the ILS Lifesaving Sport representatives at this conference and meetings. We also had a strong sense of responsibility to represent Lifesaving Sport to the best of our ability.
The next Sportaccord Forum will be in Lausanne in November 2010. The next Sportaccord Conference & AGM’s will be in April 2011 in London, UK.
Dr. Steve Beerman Dr Harald Vervaecke