Last year Russia hosted the Olympic Games, and 2015 was a special year for sporting officials. They had to prove that the development of sport was going on systemically. The share of citizens has increased by almost 5.7 million in just the last three years, according to Vitaly Mutko, the Russian Sports Minister. “30% of our citizens regularly participate in sports. That's 31 million people. If we take the public opinion polls, the percentage of people who are engaged in sports reaches 40%. Sport became fashionable, it is becoming a trend, and we are able to announce that we are in a different stage of development. If in 2008-2009 our task was to convince, tell, involve in sports, now our task is to answer the growing demands of the population.”
Public opinion polls show that today 57% of citizens would like to engage in sports. “They need opportunities and conditions. So we just need to keep up with these increasing opportunities and the willingness of our citizens, to create more sports facilities, recreational areas, and hold more events. Naturally, this was accomplished by two ways and methods,” Mutko said.
The first is the holding of mass sport events. According to the Minister, in 2015 the Ministry held about 300 sporting events. “The total coverage of the population by these projects covers up to 80 million people at all stages. We have revived the whole range of Spartakiades. We began to systematically support such projects as 'Leather Ball', 'Golden Puck', 'Ski Track of Russia', 'Cross of the Nation'. That is, all of these projects are already becoming branded, giving impetus to the development.” The Minister says that the government also supports such competitions as 'Night Hockey League', the Caucasian Games, 'Mini-football in schools', and 'Mini-football in universities'.
The second way is the creation of conditions. “The federal target program and other investment projects allowed us to increase greatly the capacity of our facilities in recent years. I can tell you that today the capacity of sports facilities amounts to about 7 million people. Those are 264,000 sports facilities. If you compare the statistics, somewhere around 38,000 sports facilities were built over these years through various sources and programs. Of course, the federal government built major facilities with the target program. Large companies such as 'Gazprom', 'Lukoil', 'Rosneft', and many other similar companies, they have their own development programs. Of course, 'Gazprom' spends up to 6 billion a year. The 'Gazprom to Children' program, you can see dozens, hundreds of sports facilities that they built from the Far East to Eastern Siberia,” Mutko stated. On all investment programs, 1533 sports facilities were built from 2015 to 2016. The program has been implemented by 94%. Even before the end of the year, around 30 sports facilities will be put into operation.
