EDWIN TONG – MASS PARTICIPATION SPORTS TO BE SAFELY REINTRODUCED

Edwin Tong, the Minister for Culture, Community and Youth, announced in parliament on Wednesday (9 March) that sporting events with mass participation, will be reintroduced safely this year.

This will be part of the Bring Sport Back initiative, where the government will commit $20 million into the programme to reinvigorate sports in Singapore.

Here is a snippet of his statement

1. In 2022, we want to step it up.
2. Like arts, sports is a social “glue” that brings us together, as we cheer on our athletes fighting hard for Singapore, or as we develop friendships by simply engaging in a game or two on the field or on the court.
3. We will commit $20M to our Bring Sport Back program in 2022. This is designed to reinvigorate Singapore sports, bring people back to play and enjoy sports together, and, through sports, reconnect with one another.
4. Bring Sport Back will focus on three key elements:
   
   a) First, we will safely reintroduce mass participation events for all, through more community events and sports festivals. To facilitate this, SportSG will be opening a grant call to fund mass participation events at up to $50,000 per award under the Blended Events Grant – Bring Sport Back edition.  
   
   b) Second, we will ramp up community participation in sports through enhanced programming and more group activities. 
   
   i. Currently, more than 170 facilities have already resumed 5 against 5 team sports. We are working on resuming larger team sports capacities, across more facilities around Singapore, bringing it back to full capacity in several phases.
   
   ii. We will roll out more leagues and competitions for people of all ages under the ActiveSG umbrella. These include the ActiveSG Cup launch, and  ActiveSG Leagues for Athletics, Badminton and Canoeing. 
   
   iii. ActiveSG Academies and Clubs will ramp up capacity of high-quality programmes, to strengthen sport development, social integration, health &  wellness, and inculcate strong values of resilience and determination, values that one can get through sport participation. They will also offer additional  pathways for youth athlete development at the elite level. 
   iv. We have also picked up growing interest in pickleball, I think some members would be familiar with that sport.  An increasingly popular sport  particularly amongst our seniors, we will continue to keep our ears to the ground and will in this case, of Pickleball, increase the frequency of this and  any other popular activities that will bring people back to sports. 
   
   c) Third, we will optimise facilities and spaces to encourage people to return and play together. These spaces will be community-driven, serving the unique needs of our different neighbourhoods. These include repurposing spaces for a range of sports, and converting underused spaces into outdoor gyms. 
5. We hope that these measures will encourage Singaporeans to resume sporting and wellness activities safely.

Image source: The Cage