News article
Sustainability round-up: November 2
The latest sustainability round-up focuses on safeguarding, the cost of motorsport and affecting diversity, Real Betis Balompié’s three-year fight against climate change and questions over Saudi Arabia’s almost-agreed hosting of the 2034 FIFA World Cup.
The first-ever FIFA Safeguarding Summit took place last week, with more than 100 attendees from 70 Member Associations graduating from the FIFA Safeguarding in Sport Diploma. The objective of the summit was to share safeguarding best practices and lessons learned.
The already high and ever-increasing cost of competing in motorsport at a young age is limiting diversity. A recent report from the BBC highlighted the journey of Dhian Singh Pahal, whose father is trying to compete against “multi-millionaires” to help his son onto the motorsport ladder. Motorsport UK told BBC Asian Network the number of ethnically diverse people that work in the industry equates to less than 3%.
Spanish LaLiga football club Real Betis Balompié has celebrated three years of its ‘Forever Green’ environmental sustainability platform. During this time, Real Betis has worked on a number of initiatives, including cleaning up natural space, installing a fleet of scooters and electric bicycles for club employees, and encouraging fans to be be more green. Since the 2018-19 base season, Real Betis has reduced its emissions by nearly 31%.
Saudi Arabia’s ultimately uncontested bid to host the 2034 FIFA World Cup has raised a number of concerns. Issues around human rights, FIFA’s handling of the bidding process, calendar disruption, player welfare, women’s rights abuses, the criminalisation of homosexuality and more, have been discussed. Critics have accused participants of ‘sportswashing’, but Saudi authorities have denied this and insisted their bid is designed to modernise the country.
Image: David Armstrong on Unsplash