The Youth Athlete Development (YAD) Workshops held recently in the four main regional centres around the country has been hailed a success.
Run by the Papua New Guinea Olympic Committee (PNGOC), the workshops involved 127 participants from across the regions, held from January 21st- 28th, 2023.
Attending sports included, Athletics, Badminton, Basketball, Boxing, Body Building, Cricket,
Football, Golf, Gymnastics, Hockey, Karate, Kickboxing, Lawn Bowls, Netball, Para Sports, Powerlifting, Rugby Touch, Rugby League, Rugby Union, Sailing, Special Olympics, Swimming, Teqball, Va’a (Outrigger Canoeing), Volleyball and Weightlifting.
The purpose of the expert delivered workshops aligns with the PNGOC Team PNG Performance Strategy 2021-2024, which has a key focus on talent identification and development under its development pathways to help its member and affiliate national federations build their talent pool.
This will help in providing a framework and pathway for progression into the elite representational levels of Team PNG across the three respective games movements it serves.
“Part of the sustained success of Team PNG for future generations involves planning for the future with close collaboration from key stakeholders being the PNG Sports Foundation through High Performance Sports PNG and the National Sports Institute and members and affiliates of the PNGOC,” said PNGOC Secretary General Auvita Rapilla.
She acknowledged the participation of the local level and provincial governments, who also attended the regional workshops, adding that their understanding and collaboration with sports in the outer regions will help sustain the YAD programs moving forward.
Outreach to the four regions was made possible through the backing of Olympic Solidarity and funding support from Kumul Consolidated Holding Limited who are the major sponsors of the Team PNG Performance Strategy 2021-2024.
Team PNG Performance Coordinator, Chris Amini shared that there are a lot of challenges faced by sports in the outer provinces from their tour of the four regions, of which the three main ones identified are:
- Lack of communication from National Federations down to the members
- Lack of resources to help drive TID programs and
- Lack of sports coaches to drive development.
The workshops were facilitated by Australian consultants and experts in Talent Identification and Development, Dr. Peter Davis and Dr. Jason Gulbin who also specialize in sport management and high-performance sports.