Doha Declaration -- Youth Key to Advancing Sport & Environment

ATR's Coverage of the

2011 World Conference on

Sport and Environment in Doha

is Proudly Sponsored by

The Qatar Olympic Committee

(ATR) Young people are the hope of the movement to make sport a good fit for the environment says the final report from the 9th World Conference on Sport and Environment in Doha, Qatar.

Tops on a list of actions from the report is a recommendation for the IOC "to explore various methods of engaging young people in sustainable development issues beyond the Youth Olympic Games and for the IOC to "to promote the involvement of young athletes in future World Conferences and continental seminars on Sport and Environment."

This conference, a biennial event since 1995, is the first to use Youtube as a way to reach the world – especially internet savvy young people.

"In the future at conferences, especially for the environment [young people] have much at stake, it is their future, their sustainable future, I would like to invite them to every future conference on sport and the environment," said Pal Schmitt, chair of the IOC Sport and Environment Commission, at a press conference to close the meeting which ran from April 30 to May 2.

The call to include youth in the work on sport and the environment was one of the common themes that cut across the Doha conference. Athletes from the Youth Olympic Games in Singapore as well as youth journalists who covered the Games fittingly were the panelists for the final session of the meeting.

The conference is a result of recommendations made at the 1994 Olympic Congress in Paris. Originally a solo project of the IOC, the conference is now shared with the United Nations Environmental Program. The meeting was hosted by the Qatar National Olympic Committee.

In an interview with Around the Rings, Schmitt noted the venue for this year's conference was a good choice given Qatar's rising prominence in world sport.

"Let us not forget Qatar has a significant role, newly in the world of sport. They are not only bidding for Olympic Games or world cups but they are active participating. They set a very good example of even difficult circumstances you can do if you really want to, to make sport popular to use sport as education. They put emphasis on international participation. And of course this is a very fragile country so they have to take multiple efforts to take whatever effort they have to protect their green," said Schmitt.

Schmitt says the 2011 conference is also being regarded as a necessary step to the Rio+20 summit next year to revisit the steps taken in the 1992 "Earth Summit".

"The timing is important because it is one year before the next Rio de Janeiro world conference. So we can measure ourself and ask questions. Are we on the right track?"

Numbers released by conference organizers say more than 650 participants from 80 countries took part in the meeting. All three upcoming Olympics, London, Sochi and Rio sent representatives. All three of the bid cities for the 2018 Winter Olympics took part as well.

Led by IOC President Jacques Rogge, about two dozen IOC members made the trek to Doha, a number of them members of Schmitt’s sport and environment commission, The 25-member commissionwill meet Tuesday in Doha to begin planning for Rio+20 and the next conference in 2013. The venue is yet to be determined.

Written and reported in London by Ed Hula.