The Barbados government is rolling out a major sports development program aiming to make sports a key social and economic pillar over the next seven years.
At the same time Minister of Youth, Sports and Community Development, Charles Griffith, is concerned about how some local sports federations are being run and essentially told them to get their act together.
Mr. Griffith spoke as he led off discussion in the House of Assembly on a resolution to note the Green Paper on the National Sports Policy.
The Minister notes there is keen interest in having a new national stadium but warned that will take time while noting that it is being worked on in collaboration with the Chinese.
He listed a number of initiatives ongoing or planned including establishing community gyms with the intention of having one in every community, pushing sports heavily in the schools, a sports tourism thrust which seeks to have major sports teams train here and giving a 20 thousand dollar subvention to each local sporting organisation.
But he indicated major concern over how the sporting bodies are functioning and cited an example.
Mr. Griffith says he’s calling on all the National Federations to re-think how they are functioning.
Minister of Youth, Sports and Community Development, Charles Griffith.
