12.07.2023 Report on NEBA’s “Networking through sport” meeting
12.07.2023

---

NEBA’s second networking through sport meeting took place on Monday, July 10th, 2023 via ZOOM Video Conferencing, and was chaired by Ed Kalvins, Chairman of the NEBA Board and Normunds Kupcis, NEBA Director of Sport and Recreation. The invitation to attend the meeting had been addressed to those interested in organizing sports teams visit from their country to sports teams in Northern Europe or visa-versa, or to those providing services associated with sports tourism such as hotels, restaurants, transportation services and other service providers. Attendees at this meeting represented England, Scotland, Latvia, and Georgia. A Latvian tour operator also attended the meeting.

The purpose of the meeting was to continue the introductory process and to identify those who have the interest or capability of organizing sports club visits to other countries and regions, and those who can support these initiatives.

• hockey between Georgia and Latvia
• rugby between the UK and Latvia.

Separate project meetings will be help with those concerned in the coming days.

Active projects are underway with Canada and Hungary though the project leaders were not in attendance at this meeting.

It was apparent that the Medical Tourism and Business & Trade Tourism programs should be included as part of these international meetings. It was also recognized that there is value added in participants meeting each other, all be it virtually. This gives everyone an opportunity to discover other’s interests and to determine other areas of possible cooperation.

Consideration will be given to modifying the format of these meetings. It is being suggested that:

1. Monthly meetings will be expanded to include all NEBA Visit Programs. The agenda would include reports from project leaders to provide updates. Invitations to attend these meeting will be sent to those deemed to be able to benefit from the Visit Programs.
2. Separate project meetings will be held for individual projects. Invitees will include only those directly involved with the project, but information will be posted in the web site providing access to interested persons.

• a description of NEBA’s overall “Visit Program”. Current participating countries include England, Scotland, Latvia, Finland, Canada and Georgia. We are expecting others to join the initiative as it expands.
• the “Visit Latvia program” is currently the most developed of the country programs. It is based on package indicative prices including specific services, transport, accommodation and entertainment.
• The “Sports Tourism” section of the “Visit Latvia program” currently addresses hockey and curling, and is expected to eventually include basketball, football (soccer), cricket and rugby.
• Indicative package prices are provided. See https://neba-network.eu/hockey---standard for an example.

The following should be noted:

• the target audience includes all ages and those enjoying sport at the armature and recreational level,
• NEBA is a member driven organization, therefore suggestions need to be implemented by members or their partners.

Requirements for one “sports project” include:

• a visit organizer (DMC) for the visiting club - responsible for coordinating club activities with the host, international travel arrangements, providing information to travellers, arranging payments,
• a visiting club,
• a host (DMC) who undertakes to organize local programs for incoming clubs, including relevant activities, transportation and accommodation, and networking with counterparts,
• an appropriate counterpart for the visiting club as arranged by the lost.

The next meeting will be referred to as “Networking through NEBA’s Visit Programs” and will take place on Monday, August 14th, at 18.30 (Riga, Latvia time, GMT+3), 19.30 Georgia GMT+4, 16.30 United Kingdom GMT+1, 11.30 EDT Canada/US east, 8.30 PDT Canada/US west. 

NEBA considers networking through sport to be one way to develop relationships between people that could lead to successful business cooperation. The concept is new, but the groundwork has been set in our sports tourism section of our Visit Latvia program (https://neba-network.eu/sport) headed by Normunds Kupcis of the  European Recreational and Old-timers Hockey Association (http://www.euroha.eu/en/). Normunds has been arranging hockey team visits to Latvia for quite some time now. We hope to expand the concept under NEBA umbrella in the months to come.

For further information, please contact Ed Kalvins at ed.kalvins@neba-network.eu.

Please follow https://neba-network.eu/ for more information.