The Danish Football Association gets awarded for its efforts in environmental sustainability
The Danish Football Association (DBU) has officially obtained the certification “Green Sport” under the Sports Confederation of Denmark (DIF)’s sustainability programme.
Green sport is a two-year climate and sustainability certification offered by the Sports Confederation of Denmark (DIF) and targeted at DIF’s 62 specialist federations. The purpose of the certification is to support concrete behavioural changes in sport federations and associations as a means of reducing the climate and environmental footprint and to promote the agenda throughout society.
DBU is one of eight specialist associations that have received the certification. To be certified as a Green Sport association, DBU had to prepare a climate and sustainability strategy at the time of application and select two to four individual initiatives that were aligned with DIF. The agreed upon initiatives are circular economy, green transition, sustainable events, sustainable infrastructure – some of them perfectly reflecting DBU’s efforts and priorities under the ACCESS project, too.
In addition, DBU had to meet three mandatory requirements – appointing one person on the board and one in the administration who is responsible for the association’s work with climate and sustainability, participating in relevant thematic events organized by DIF, including being part of DIF’s climate and sustainability network, and contributing to sparring with other specialized associations and measuring selected parts of its climate footprint.
Certified associations must annually give an update on their climate and sustainability work at a meeting with DIF’s administration. The Green Sport certification is valid for two years.
DBU FOOTBALL SOCIAL RESPONSIBILLITY STRATEGY
For the first time, DBU has made a comprehensive action plan for environmental and social sustainability in Danish football which is the overall frame for the green certification.
DBU’s action plan uses the UEFA terms Football Social Responsibility is based on 11 different FSR areas under the main headings Health, Social responsibility and Green transition. It is inspired by CSR and the SDGs, but it is adapted to the world of football. It is therefore no coincidence that there are 11 areas.
The action plan provides an operational framework on 63 initiate and manage FSR efforts and follows DBU’s overall strategy for Danish football – ‘gather and excite’. The action plan runs until end of 2025.