Close

Istanbul 2020 At IOC World Conference

A senior Istanbul 2020 delegation arrived in Lima Thursday to attend the 15th IOC World Conference on Sport for All, saying that Turkey’s first ever Olympic and Paralympic Games will be the catalyst for a huge rise in mass sport participation, particularly among the nation’s 31 million young people under the age of 25.

Hasan Arat, Istanbul 2020 chairman, IOC member and President of the National Olympic Committee of Turkey said, “Istanbul 2020 can be a bridge to an historic impact for the Olympic Movement and the young people of Turkey. Nearly 50 per cent of Turkey’s population is under 25 and we produce around 700,000 university graduates every year.

“Our Games will provide them with a generation of opportunities across the sports sector, and they are ready to take up the baton for the Olympic Movement. An Olympic and Paralympic Games in Istanbul in 2020 really will mean ‘Sport for All'”.

The Istanbul 2020 delegation will be looking to learn the latest best practices in the field of Sport for All from the conference’s 300-plus participants, as well as sharing some of its own.

Alp Berker, Istanbul 2020’s Director of Sport said, “our concept has been developed to harness the massive social benefits of making sport more accessible to young people. Istanbul 2020 will reinvigorate grass roots, sports, so that more young people than ever before in Turkey will play and stay in sport, particularly sports considered ‘non-traditional’ in our part of the world”.

scroll to top