On International Women’s Day 2024, the International World Games Association (IWGA) is taking the opportunity to celebrate the progress made towards gender equality at The World Games, one of the most gender-balanced multi-sport events on the planet.
Providing equal opportunities to women and girls, as well as empowering them, is a fundamental principle of the IWGA and is reflected in one of its core values, inclusiveness.
Today and throughout 2024, we will continue to recognise the essential role women play in growing our sports. We also want to celebrate The World Games’ female athletes for the strong role-models and icons that they are for millions of young girls around the world. Their participation in sport at elite level helps in breaking down barriers to pave the way for a more equal and inclusive society. Their relentless commitment and dedication brings hope and accelerates change to fight stereotypes and gender norms.
Major adjustments to The World Games’ sports programme have been made over time to steadily increase women’s participation. Additional quota places and new mixed-gender events in more sports are amongst the recent novelties.
For example in Billiards, Birmingham 2022 offered 3 men’s medal events and 1 woman’s, while Chengdu 2025 will see 3 men’s and 3 women’s events and 1 mixed event. Women’s Floorball is also new on the 2025 programme. And finally, two sports, Lacrosse & Flag Football which will share the same venue, will be exclusively for women’s teams in Chengdu.
In terms of gender participation, we can proudly claim that about 50 more female athletes compared to the total of men will take part in the upcoming edition of The World Games. International sport has been taking significant steps towards inclusivity and equality, and some female athletes from The World Games have been at the forefront of this movement; just to name a few, the six female athletes named below were praised by the IWGA last year for their outstanding performances and contribution. They were in turn named Athlete of the Month. Flag Football Diana Flores (MEX), Squash Tinnie Gilis (BEL), Wushu Nandhira Maurishka (INA), Karate Hikaru Ono (JPN), Gymnastics Candy Briere-Vetillard (FRA), Floorball Maja Viström (SWE).
Another example of leading women is Colombian Frisbee player Valeria Cardenas topping the Athlete of the Year 2022 Award.
Furthermore, the interim IWGA Athletes’ Committee comprises four women out of seven members, with Karate Olympic champion Sandra Sanchez (ESP) leading the group. Flying Disc Cat Phillips (AUS), DanceSport Justyna Mozdzonek (POL) and Powerlifting Rhaea Stinn (CAN) are all joining the drive to push for more inclusion of women in leadership and decision-making positions.
IWGA President José Perurena said: “The IWGA is proud to be openly supporting International Women’s Day. Gender equality is always an important matter for us when it comes to The World Games sports programme. Although there is still a long way to go, we have reached great results for the next edition of The World Games in Chengdu, China, where already it is clear that more female athletes will be taking part, with additional events opened for their participation. This is our contribution to a more gender-equal world!”
The International World Games Association (IWGA) is a non-profit-making international sports organisation recognised and supported by the International Olympic Committee. The IWGA comprises 38 International Member Sports Federations. It administers and promotes The World Games (TWG), a multi-sport event held every four years that features around 35 sports on its programme. The next edition of TWG will be in Chengdu (CHN) from 7-17 August 2025. 5,000 participants from more than 100 countries are expected to take part in this 12th edition. The latest Games were hosted by Birmingham, Alabama (USA).
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For more information, please contact the IWGA Media and Communication team: [email protected], Tel: +41 21 311 12 97, or visit our web site.
