Charter

A nation of active women has far-reaching benefits; it will help tackle health, social, equality issues – to name a few. But it’s going to take a team effort to get more women and girls involved. That is why Australia needs a National Strategic Plan for Women’s Sport and Active Recreation.

The Australian Womensport and Recreation Association or AWRA (former name for Women Sport Australia) Charter launched in March 2013 and was designed to give you all the information you need about women in sport and to inspire you to take action.

A Charter for Active Australian Women

AWRA wanted to send out a positive message about what can be done to increase participation of women and girls in sport and physical activities, so we started by identifying key areas for change:

1. Prioritising female participation in all aspects of sport and active recreation.
2. Increasing women’s participation in leadership roles
3. Addressing the barriers girls and women face in sport and physical activity
4. Increasing media coverage of the activities and achievements of female athletes

We then looked at the current statistics and issues that affect these key areas and identified why it is important to make some changes, leading into a number of actions/solutions (total of 20) to help develop our vision of “A strong and healthy Australian culture through increasing the active participation of women and girls in sport, physical activity and active recreation.”

Part of our motivation was to lobby the Australian Government to produce a National Strategic Plan for Women’s Sport and Active Recreation. One was draughted but did not get finalised. However, a positive outcome was a grant from the Australian Government to employ a part-time Executive Officer.