Sustainability in Football: Sant’Anna School Institute of Management, UEFA and FIGC coordinate the EU project TACKLE to guarantee sustainable innovation in Euro 2020 European Championship
Every year, FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) promotes equality and presents its own approach to deliver a strategy for strengthening diversity and anti-discrimination. Ever since the Olympics in 2000, the governing bodies of world and European sports have recognized the responsibility that comes with organizing sporting events. The 2018 FIFA Conference for Equality and Inclusion aimed to advocate the role of football as a tool for integration and accessibility.
Concrete steps towards sustainability, green stadiums, waste management and recycling, city environmental measures, environmental frameworks and policies to make up for the carbon footprint for major sporting events, have been released for continual improvement of ISO 14001 and ISO 20121. The ISO management system standards offer guidance and best practice to manage events and control their social, economic and environmental impact.
The EU funded project TACKLE (Teaming up for a conscious kick for the Legacy of Environment), coordinated by Sant’Anna School Institute of Management, in partnership with UEFA Union of European Football Association, FIGC Italian Football Association, FRF Romanian Football Federation and SvFF Swedish Football Association, the independent pan-European media network specialized in EU policies Euractiv and companies AMIU and LIPOR operating waste management plans for ports and harbors, is aimed to improve environmental management during football events.
Focusing on the Euro 2020 European Championship, being played in 12 different countries, the TACKLE project will increase the awareness of environmental protection. Informing the relevant stakeholders through guidelines mechanisms, can help create a sustainable society that will trigger virtuous cycles for the environment. The role of UEFA initiatives in environmental protection is becoming more important as a major driving force in the building of a comprehensive sustainable strategy for football events. Expanding the scope of these initiatives and create a social mechanism by which football associations can deliver green services through voluntary activities, will mitigate the environmental impacts.
“These guidelines principles are expected to help create a sustainable football society that will trigger virtuous cycles for implementation of the ISO 20121” - said professors Marco Frey and Fabio Iraldo, as the scientific supervisors of TACKLE project. “Our team - they added – worked on environmental frameworks and city environmental measures for Turin Olympics in 2006 and Milan EXPO 2015. Today, we expect the close collaboration on sustainability matters among FIFA, UEFA, FIGC, FRF and SvFF will be crucial in the process of ensuring that our strategy is relevant given the local context of the 12 host countries”.
