European Commission

After thoroughly assessing all Commissioners-designate, the European Parliament voted to approve the new European Commission on November 27^th, allowing president Ursula von der Leyen and her team to take office on December 1^st. The 11 women and 15 men will have till 2024 to implement their agenda in cooperation with the Council of the European Commission and the European Parliament.

EuropeActive was invited to participate on Thursday, 21st November in the #BeInclusive EU sport Awards ceremony hosted by the European Commission in Brussels. The Awards seek to highlight the outstanding work and commitment led by different organisations in promoting social integration through sport across Europe with the aim of breaking barriers and help build a more inclusive society.

9 shortlisted projects will be showcased to inspire other organisations and individuals around Europe and the 3 best projects will be awarded €10,000 each. Finalists will receive €2,500 each. A panel of distinguished speakers will debate on the power of sport in fostering social inclusion.

The Romanian Presidency and the European Commission organised a conference on “The advantages of practicing sport in an organised environment for people with fewer opportunities” from 13^th to 14^th June 2019 in Constanţa, Romania. During the two-day event representatives from sport organisations, member states and the EU institutions were discussing the social dimension of sport and the opportunities for sport and physical activity stakeholders to involve people at risk. People might have fewer opportunities due to their cultural, ethnic or social background, due to disability or age.

Over 100 representatives of the national coordinating bodies and partners of the European Week of Sport met in Sintra, Portugal on 23-24 May 2019 for the Key Players' Seminar. The event was organised by the Sport Unit of the European Commission and hosted by the Portuguese Institute of Sport and Youth (IPDJ) to ensure that the communication strategies of all EWoS supporters are aligned.

This year the #BeActive marketing campaign behind the European Week of Sport is led by the BCW which will also oversee the website content and social media posting.

On Tuesday 4th June 2019, the European Commission’s Sport Unit invited key organisations working on promoting physical activity to talk about the benefits of exercising. After a short introduction of the event and the speakers by Yves Le Lostecque, the head of the sport unit, Dr. Jean-Francois Toussaint gave the keynote presentation on the benefits of physical activity. Dr. Toussaint, who’s a director at the esteemed French institute for sport and performance, emphasised the positive link the between being physically active and longevity.

The European Commission's Knowledge Gateway for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention, developed by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) and DG Health and Food Safety (SANTE), contains several information on health-related topics. Physical activity and sedentarism has been recently added as a new topic of the Knowledge Gateway. 

The chapter on physical activity contains a broad range of relevant studies and policy documents, going from defining physical activity to policy recommendations and the effects on health. All entries are high quality peer reviewed publications, providing you with reliable figures and information. 

One big promise from the European Union is the free movement of people and goods. Therefore, mutual understanding of competences and qualifications is crucial to make labour market mobility in the EU reality. And it has been done a lot in this regard: NQFs, EQF, ECTS and ECVET are so called transparency tools currently used by all member states to support transparency of certificates, diplomas and qualifications.

Ultimately, transparency is necessary to value and to be able to remunerate persons’ work in accordance with their skills, knowledge and competences.

With the SciView project, the European Commission Directorate General for Health and Food Safety (DG SANTE) provides new insight on more effective and efficient actions to tackle challenges related to nutrition and physical activity. The pilot project aims toincrease the evidence-base by providing independent, accurate summaries of recent and relevant information and statistics on determinants of diet and physical activity and their impact on health.

A healthy lifestyle includes a healthy diet, regular physical activity, mental wellbeing and drug abstinence. The European Commission recognised the need for a holistic approach to promote healthy lifestyles with the Tartu call for a healthy lifestyle, launched by Commissioners Tibor Navracsics (Education, Culture, Youth and Sport), Vytenis Andrikiukaitis (Health and Food Safety) and Phil Hogan (Agriculture and Rural Development) in 2017.

On Tuesday 5^TH February, EuropeActive attended the Sport Info Day, a fruitful event organised by the European Commission and the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA) to inform potential applicants about the Erasmus+ Sport programme and its funding opportunities.