The two-day seminar on January 8 and 9 featured 20 delegates who were leaders of the National Olympic Committees’ Women's Sports Subcommittees and of ASEAN member countries. There were also two representatives from the ASEAN Secretariat and two others from Timor-Leste.
At the seminar, Deputy Director Le Thi Hoang Yen brought an in-depth point of view on the role of women in sports and the image of women leaders, creating a strong platform for the Gender Equality campaign.
Deputy Director Le Thi Hoang Yen also shared about the activities and results that Viet Nam achieved in the field of gender equality in sports and women's sports tournaments in the country.
Deputy Director of the Sports Authority of Viet Nam Le Thi Hoang Yen delivers her presentation in the seminar
In 2024, Viet Nam cooperated with the ASEC and Seijo University to hold the ASEAN – Japan conference on gender equality in Ha Noi; researched the challenges and needs of women and girls in participating in sports and physical activities; organized the first Say2 Ladies Pickleball Grand Prix, an amateur-professional competition exclusively for women; held a Viet Nam Sports event in the month of action for gender quality and gender-based violence prevention (November 15 - December 15) and sent a message of "Equality to be promoted, sports to reach higher"…
She also affirmed that Vietnamese female athletes earned great achievements and strongly contributed to the success of the national sport delegations at many international sporting events. Twelve out of 16 Vietnamese athletes participating in the 2024 Paris Olympics were women. This statistic partly showed encouraging signs in gender equality in sports in Viet Nam.
With its tireless efforts, programs of gender equality in sports in Viet Nam have achieved remarkable results such as attracting significant public attention to female athletes. The local sport industry has held many programs and activities to promote socialization and media support for female athletes.
Businesses and social organizations have also participated in various sponsorship projects and created post-retirement employment opportunities for female athletes.
Women have received information to better understand the importance of sports for health and they effectively arranged their time to participate in sports practice.
Deputy Director Le Thi Hoang Yen said to further promote the achieved results Viet Nam has developed plans to strengthen the women leadership role in sports. After retirement, female athletes would be provided career guidance through vocational courses, conferences and seminars which will be actively implemented in the period 2025 - 2030.
Japan-ASEAN Gender Equality in Sports Seminar was organized to continue implementing the discussed issues in the sixth SOMS+Japan held on August 30, 2023 in Chiang Mai, Thailand. It regarded the update of the ASEAN-Japan Action Project on Sports and Gender Equality by the International Research Center for Sports and Gender Equality (SGE) at Seijo University. It also connected activities that were implemented in the period 2021-2023.
Deputy Director of the Sports Authority of Viet Nam Le Thi Hoang Yen delivers her presentation in the seminar
During two days, delegates received reports on the results of workshops and projects carried out in previous years. Further, many issues were presented and discussed such as: the importance of data and why data was important for sport policy and gender equality; what were the global initiatives and strategies for sport policy; and data collection and why data was important.
At the seminar, delegates also presented researches and specific data to clarify each issue and develop a gender and development agenda which was a strategic plan to collect, monitor and evaluate gender.
The seminar’s goal was that delegates from participating countries can identify indicators for sport policy in their country. They can identify gender-specific indicators and data based on national targets.
It was expected that the seminar would change the perspective and raise awareness of countries about reviewing and collecting data based on indicators as well as identifying which relevant organizations needed to participate in data collection.
The seminar also aimed to assist ASEAN countries to implement these goals at home. They were supported by a list of common gender-disaggregated data collected from member countries.
The Japan-ASEAN Gender Equality in Sports Seminar in the Philippines was a part of the project titled "ASEAN-Japan Action on Sports-Gender Equality’.
"The Japanese government organized a four-day workshop in the spirit of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and Paralympics in 2021. Aiming at 10 ASEAN member countries, the workshop was to enhance cooperation between ASEAN and Japan by promoting gender equality in sports.
Many ASEAN government officials, heads of the National Olympic Committees’ Women in Sports Subcommittees attended the event. Along with them were young female sports leaders who developed feasible strategies for their countries and educated a new generation of leaders who could contribute to this project's goals.
The multiple-phased project is to promote community-based programs, sports, and physical activities that are non-discriminatory and accessible to all facilities, including open spaces, suitable environmental conditions, for all ages and levels, contributing to the ASEAN sports plan in the period of 2021-2025./.
Thanh Ha