2010-01-21
Physical Education and Sports Development without Clear Directions
Why hardly half of population in Lithuania are engaged in sports, the number of healthy schoolchildren is decreasing and funds allocated for physical education and sports do not bring benefit? When summarising outcomes of the audit “Development of Physical Education and Sports” the Auditor General Ms Rasa Budbergytė said: “Sports administrators should not only follow the motto of Olympic Games Citius, Altius and Fortus but also remember the appropriation managers duty to use funds in economic, efficient and effective way. According to Ms Budbegytė more attention should be devoted to the mass sport development as this is the most reliable way of improving population wellness and developing a new generation of talented athletes.
In recent years physical education and sports development received increasingly more funding: in 2008 it received 83.7 million Litas budget allocations and 122.4 million municipality budget allocations. In 2009 budget funding was reduced to 56.3 million Litas however Department of Physical Education and Sports (DPES) does not have reliable information on how much funding is received from lotteries, higher education institutions, private supporters and other sources. In auditors opinion in order to improve spending efficiency it is necessary to accumulate and analyse information relating to overall funding that is allocated to physical education and sports.
DPES does not have legal instruments to co-ordinate activities of the ministries, municipalities, higher education institutions in the area of physical education and sports therefore development of this area is insufficiently targeted, co-operation between organisations is poor, there is often an overlap in the goals of the implemented programmes. Following provisions of the Law on Physical Education and Sports only last year the Government set up the National Physical Education and Sports Council and approved its regulation. However it does not provide for co-ordination function of institutions taking part in the development of physical education and sports either.
Another problem that sport is facing is unevenly developed infrastructure. For instance in Alytus Municipality there are 3.27 sport facilities per 1000 population however in Trakai Municipality there are only 0.43 facilities. According to the number of active swimming pools Lithuania lags behind the European Union average by more than 20 times. It was stated that the number of sports bases is decreasing and their condition is becoming worse. A lot of different appropriation managers take part in the organisation of sport facilities construction and renovation works, funds are distributed among different programmes with often overlapping aims. For instance installation of universal sports grounds with artificial surface at general education schools was organised both by the Department of Physical Education and Sports, municipalities and the Ministry of Education and Science. In 2008 78 percent state investments went to construction of multifunctional sports complexes and universal arenas whereas sports facilities in education institutions received only 12 percent investments although in most of the schools there are no properly equipped sports grounds and no sports halls, and this is the reason why more than half of all the schools do not comply with the law and hygiene norms to deliver at least three physical education lessons per week.
The Audit Report denotes that the DPES should improve control of its subordinate institutions. For instance only half of 218 approved staff at the Lithuanian Olympic Sports Centre are related to the implementation of its main goal to develop young Olympic athletes and Olympic team members. Centre Director has three departments under his supervision that are managed by three deputies. Those departments have divisions managed by their heads that often have a deputy head, some even having several deputy heads. Besides sports bases are insufficiently equipped with modern equipment and inventory therefore in the period between January and September 2009 3.4 million were allocated for sportsman training abroad whereas only 57.7 thousand Litas were paid for the rent of sport bases in Lithuania. Public enterprise Lithuanian Sports Information Centre established by DPES since 2006 have been preparing Sports Encyclopaedia. Although more than 1 million Litas were spent for this purpose by now only an internet version of encyclopaedia has been produced. Besides it was determined that some of public enterprises underlet property transferred to them by the right of trust to other entities thus breaching the law.
The National Audit Office recommended the Government to develop an activity co-ordination system for sport policy implementing institutions and organisations that would ensure targeted and consistent physical education and sports development at national level, appropriate involvement of children and youth into physical education and sports activity. DPES was advised to revise administration rules for the Physical Education and Sports Support Fund and to establish objective project evaluation criteria.