The 2023 BEC Congress started this morning in Baku, Azerbaijan. After Emma Zwiebler, BEC Director and Chair of the Development Committee, and Dr. Taleh Ziyadov, president of the Azerbaijan Badminton Federation, officially opened the event in the morning, delegates from 43 European countries were coming together for the Members' Forum.
Emma Zwiebler explained that the Members' Forum serves two main purposes:
Giving members the chance to speak to one another to exchange information, experiences, best practices and new ideas. And giving the members the possibility to feedback the work of Badminton Europe and together define how the organisation should move on.
Both have been taken care of in today's forum with meetings running from 9:00AM in the morning to 4:00PM in the afternoon.
Among others, the members were discussing topics like Inclusivity & Para badminton, sustainability, player development and the presentation of BEC's major events.
But there was also a highlight that was looking beyond the horizon of badminton:
"We've just had a presentation from the CEO of Paris2024. We are in a incredibly fortunate position as a sport that that person is also a huge badminton supporter and BWF Council Member, Étienne Thobois. It was fantastic to be able to have him here in person talking about the plans they've been making for Paris2024 and really giving an insight on how they are driving the Paris2024 Games", said Emma Zwiebler.
The second day of the 2023 BEC Congress will tomorrow start with the Annual Delegates' Meeting where, among other topics, new Board Members and a new BEC president will be elected. In the evening the BEC Awards Gala will be another highlight to round up the Congress in Baku.
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