A lack of sports facilities in the South compared to the Centre-North, a reconfirmation of the correlation between the levels of sedentary lifestyle in the Italian regions and the number of sports facilities per capita and its social and economic impact on the national health system, accessibility to facilities which are unfortunately still limited for people with disabilities, the predominance of small and publicly owned structures, a wide gap between pupils and students from the North and those from the South who attend schools the vast majority of which do not have a gym.
This is what emerged from the research conducted by Svimez and Uispwith the collaboration of Sports and Health presented this morning in Rome in the WeSportUp room at the Foro Italico, where the president of Sport e Salute Spa spoke Marco Mezzaromathe president of Uisp Tiziano Pescethe director of Svimez Luca Bianchithe president of the Sports Credit Institute, Beniamino Quintieri and the research curator Serena Affuso (research carried out together with Gaetano Vecchione).
A photograph presented today, the first after the pandemic shock that has significantly affected the sector in the last three years, on the offer of sports facilities and services in the Italian regions, representing the specific and updated point of view of the operators: managers and owners of sports facilities, through a survey and three focus group sessions.
”We are happy to have contributed to this research – he says Marco Mezzaroma, president of Sport and Health – This initiative is part of a more general one that we have been invested in by the Government and the Minister for Sport to update the 2020 census of sports facilities. We have surveyed more than 77 thousand plants, we are updating the research with a particular focus on those that have been abandoned and not completed, starting from Caivano, the restructuring project, including social ones, which affects the Green Park more generally. Sports facilities are the mother of all issues; there is a lack of facilities in schools and there is a big gap between North and South. What we must all do together, which is the mission of Sport and Health, is to solve this problem”.
“Public policies need to intervene to correct the imbalances between North and South and to guarantee equal rights for all citizens – he said Tiziano Pesce, Uisp national president – Sport is an indicator of well-being, social cohesion and participation. To come to consider sport as a true right of citizenship, of constitutional rank, new political choices are needed. The Report we are presenting clearly shows us the way: to move from a concept of welfare of protection to a new idea of welfare of promotion, development and innovation. In this sense, sport, as facilities and services, the subject of the Report, is also a work opportunity for managers, operators, organizers and instructors”.
For the director of Svimez, Luca Bianchi“We must prevent sport from becoming an element of inequality, while it remains fundamental for its social and educational function. Sport is also a part of the Italian health strategy, because where you do more sport there is better health. Fragmentation of the offer is very strong between the territories, as well as between north and south. Investment in sports facilities and services is part of the country’s development policies: resources are needed to build new facilities, but also to guarantee their management. access to sport must become a right guaranteed as Lep-Essential levels of performance. Technical assistance is also necessary for the municipalities that have to implement the projects, following the criterion of need and not just the ability to win the tenders. Finally, applause for sports clubs, which despite many difficulties prove to be fundamental social actors in the area”.
“As emerged from the Uisp, Sport and Health Report, Svimez, local authorities own 63% of the country’s sports facilities and are the first to need financial support to encourage their redevelopment and modernization – he says president of the Institute for Sports Credit, Beniamino Quintieri – ICS, a leading public bank in the financing of sports facilities, plays a central role thanks to its subsidized loans with a completely reduced interest rate aimed at local authorities, in a period characterized by the dizzying growth of interest rates on mortgages. ICS provides fundamental economic support not only to local administrations but also to sports federations, promotion bodies and the entire associative world of ASD and SSD, which represent the backbone of the world of sport and sports promotion”.