Tiziano Mellarini, Regional Minister of Sports with Claude-Louis Gallien, Fisu President
TRENTO – In addition to the Winter Universiade of Trentino which starts in 3 days, the FISU Executive Committee met in the Palace of the Autonomous Province of Trento. As you may know the Region and the Province of Trento enjoy a special status in Italy which gives them substantial autonomy for the management of certain materials. The Minister of Sports in the Region, Mr. Tiziano Mellarini also opened the meeting by reaffirming the full support of local and regional political authorities for hosting the 26th Winter Universiade in Trentino. He also stressed the importance of this Universiade for the inhabitants of the region and the particular nature of this event bringing together students from about 50 different countries.
Sergio Anesi, OC President and Paolo Bouquet, pro rector of the Trento University Representatives of the 2013 WU Organising Committee then took the floor to report on the preparation for the games. Under the direction of Sergio Anesi , delegates presented a detailed picture of arrivals and the preparation of the sports venues. It appears that due to the snowfall in recent weeks and due to freezing temperatures during the night, the snow should not be a problem and all competitions will take place. Sergio Anesi then gave the floor to Paolo Bouquet , head of the Conference. He invited the EC members to take an active part in the conference which will begin on 9 December. Theme of the Conference is ” University Sport: an engine for innovation.”
The Executive Committee then listened to the report of the representatives of the OC of the 2015 Winter Universiade in Granada. The OC is now in a key phase of its preparation with a little over a year to go before the Games will kick-off. Not having received the necessary building sites selected for cross-country skiing and biathlon and not been able to offer a suitable alternative, the OC, in accordance with the FISU permissions, unfortunately had to withdraw these two sports of the programme of the Universiade . FISU will study with the International Sports Federations concerned the possibility of alternative university competitions in both sports in 2015.
The President then presented his report, followed by the Treasurer and the Secretary-General/CEO. All three stressed the importance in their presentations for FISU to explore new ways and develop new projects oriented towards universities and in collaboration with ISFs.
Stefan Bergh , President of the Committee for the Development of University Sport (CDSU) pointed out, among other things, the importance of adopting “sustainable development ” within the FISU guiding principles and to apply it in a maximum possible areas .
Presentation of the 2014 FISU Forum with the OC delegates and Alison Odell (right)
Alison Odell , President of the EDUC Commission of FISU gave an update on cultural events including the preparation of the Winter Universiade Conference and also on the 2014 Forum to be held in Gwangju in March. A delegation of the Organizing Committee of the 2014 Forum also presented this important event.
Rosaura Méndez , Chair of the Committee for Gender Equality (CGE) took stock of ongoing activities within the Committee and in particular on the presence of CGE at the 6th World Conference on Women and Sport (IWG ) to be held in Helsinki from 12 to 15 June 2014 .
To conclude today’s session , the delegations of the 2017 Universiade presented their report to the Board .
The Taipei 2017 Universiade delegation
The Executive Committee of FISU marked its agreement on adding two optional sports for the 2017 Summer Universiade to be held in Taipei City, i.e. golf and weightlifting (in addition to archery baseball and badminton). Finally, the Executive Committee through the voice of its President Claude- Louis Gallien congratulated the work done by the OC of Almaty, the city that will host the 2017 Winter Universiade.
Yvan Dufour