The fifth International Olympic Committee Conference on Women in Sport concluded three days of discussions at L.A. Live this weekend with historic results. Local IOC members Anita deFrantz and Angela Ruggiero of Los Angeles joined esteemed panelists from around the world to usher in a new era of women’s sports and new formats for sports teams including men and women together. That reinforced the theme of the conference: “Together Stronger.”
Eight hundred delegates from 135 countries learned more about women’s achievements in the world of sports and discussed ways to apply sports success to help more women achieve more ambitious goals. This coincided with recent policy decision to introduce both men’s and women’s competitions each time a new sport is introduced to the Olympics. The 2016 Summer Olympic Games will include golf for the first time and give the world’s top women golfers a global audience. Male and female combined relay teams have already participated in the Youth Olympic Games and are in the planning stages for the 2016 Olympic Games.
Intersport, the world’s largest retailer of sports equipment, presented a notable distinction of women leading the world of sport. Women account for seventy percent of all purchases of sports equipment and sportswear. Intersport is energetically expanding its product offerings and enhancing its product displays to appeal to sophisticated women shoppers.
The program also introduced several women sports journalists and explained how their success in a career that had few female broadcasters or photographers until recently. They confirmed that their future is bright. Concurrent discussions also promoted more broadcast time for women’s sports events.
The conference discussions were not able to make much headway regarding the sensitive topic of compensation. Women playing soccer on FIFA teams generally make about $25,000 to $35,000 a year, plus whatever they can earn from coaching or tutoring when they are not traveling. Male players in FIFA often earn fifty to one-hundred times as much. Tennis and golf are much closer to parity and may provide more direction towards this goal.
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