FINA has announced a new initiative, called the “FINA Olympic Aquatics Support Program”, which is aimed at providing funds to FINA Member Federations to assist in the development of aquatic sports.
The program will consist of $21 million dollars for a 4 year budget, which will be distributed to National Federations that attend either the FINA World Championships (LCM or SCM) or the FINA World Junior Championships. The money will be granted in addition to funds that are already available through the FINA Development Program. The funds for this new program will be available to all disciplines of aquatic sports, and are meant to “improve the organization and professionalism of [their] operations and the sport level of athletes”.
Federations will be able to submit proposals for projects to the FINA Olympic Aquatics Support Program, which will be reviewed and approved by a FINA commission. Funds are available for projects in the following areas:
- construction, refurbishment or maintenance of facilities
- purchase or hire of sports material equipment
- administration fees
- technology resources (website, online ranking, database);
- technical support
- preparation and training of athletes, coaches and officials
- staging and participation at national and continental competitions
- talent-identification programs.
To read FINA‘s entire press release on the FINA website, click here.
I might be showing my cynicism here but this reminds me of the ‘development’ programs run by FIFA which are really a way of handing funds to the elites and kleptocrats thar run football(soccer) in third world countries. Just as the FIFA leadership dispenses ‘development’ money and in return obtains the the votes of corrupt officials from developing countries to stay in power, so do the leaders of FINA.