Pioneering a New Paradigm in Sports Development

The national sports scene sent out positive signals in 2019. Among them was the courage the government showed to use the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games as a medium for developing junior athletes.

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Hendra Purnama of Indonesia releases an arrow during the men\'s individual recurve final on Sunday (8/12/2019) during the Philippine 2019 SEA Games at the Clark Parade Grounds in Pampanga, the Philippines. Hendra won the gold medal on defeating Myanmar archer Htike Linn Oo 6-4.

The national sports scene sent out positive signals in 2019. Among them was the courage the government showed, through the Youth and Sports Ministry, to use the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games as a medium for developing junior athletes. The step, carried out consistently, could be a great jumping point towards elite championships in Asia and the world.

The public has urged the use of the SEA Games as part of the athlete regeneration program for many years. However, the government seemed trapped in the “gold medal curse” and always targeted becoming the overall champion of the regional multisport event. Consequently, athlete regeneration was slow in many sports.

Starting in 2019, the Youth and Sports Ministry set a 60 percent quota for junior athlete participation and a 40 percent quota for senior athletes for the SEA Games. The quota has yet to be met, as this year’s composition was still 50:50. Nevertheless, the move has established a new balance. Youth athletes debuted to make us proud, including 49-kilogram weightlifter Windy Cantika Aisah, who is only 17.

As a result, badminton has become the pride of the nation.

The move to use the SEA Games to develop young athletes is nothing new, as the national badminton association (PBSI) has employed the strategy for years, not blinded by the glittering temptation of a SEA Games gold medal. The PBSI has long maintained its grand vision of pursuing prestigious targets like the All England, the World Championships, the Asian Games and the Olympics.

Badminton was able to form its paradigm under the support of the Badminton World Federation (BWF) and the tiered international competition system it managed. Furthermore, the PBSI has an independent budget it uses to regularly send athletes to BWF tournaments.

As a result, badminton has become the pride of the nation. Indonesian shuttlers have successfully maintained their competitiveness in the world to the highest level, the Olympics.

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Indonesian champion hurdler Emilia Nova on Sunday (9/12/2019) at New Clark City Athletics Stadium in Capas, the Philippines.

The established system in badminton is an ideal model for building competitive national sports. The consequential need is, understandably, a bigger budget for the national training camps. This can be difficult for less popular sports that have minimal sponsorship. It is unlikely that sports associations can rely on the government, due to the Youth and Sports Ministry’s small budget.

The ministry’s 2019 budget was a paltry Rp 1.95 trillion (US$139.73 million) of the Rp 2.46 quadrillion state budget. The national training camp budget was just Rp 386.06 billion, including Rp 266.2 billion to prepare for the 2019 SEA Games and the 2020 Olympics, and Rp 119.86 billion to prepare for the 2020 ASEAN Para Games and the 2020 Paralympics.

This is where the problem lies, as the ministry has divided sports association into four clusters based on their achievements at the SEA Games, the Asian Games and the Olympics. Badminton and weightlifting have been placed in one cluster with a larger budget allocation, due to their great achievements in the three multisport events and other competitions. However, other Olympic sports with less stellar achievements have been placed in lower ranked clusters with smaller budgets. This diminishes the opportunity for the athletes, including swimmers, gymnasts and archers, to benefit from accelerated athlete development.

It will be hard to develop local swimmers with only a small budget.

For instance, swimming, a mainstay of Olympic gold medals, cannot even compete at the Southeast Asian level, let alone the Asian. Indonesian swimmers have been finding it difficult to beat even their Vietnamese counterparts, whose quality has skyrocketed and to be on a par with Singaporean swimmers. The Indonesian Swimming Association (PRSI) proposed a budget of Rp 52 billion this year, but was granted only around Rp 9 billion – about a tenth of Singapore’s swimming budget.

Adopting the sports cluster model is a progressive move that can accelerate the development of Olympic sports. However, the criteria for cluster one should be adjusted so as to accelerate the development of sports that have won Olympic golds. It will be hard to develop local swimmers with only a small budget. We only won one swimming gold at In the the 2019 SEA Games.

KOMPAS/ADRIAN FAJRIANSYAH

The Indonesian contingent takes part in the parade during the closing ceremony of the 2019 Southeast Asian (SEA) Games on Wednesday (11/12/2019).

The cluster model should adopt additional criteria, including prioritizing athlete development in “mother of sports” such as gymnastics and athletics.

A study from the National Development Planning Agency (Bappenas) has identified 10 priority Olympic sports for Indonesia: badminton, weightlifting, archery, athletics, gymnastics, swimming, sports climbing, taekwondo, rowing and cycling. These sports should be prioritized, as their athletes have won gold medals at world championships and the Olympics, as well as other multisport events. This additional criterion must be included in the 2020 budget allocation.

A more defined set of criteria will lead to more rational budget allocation towards accelerating Olympic achievements. The Youth and Sports Ministry has said that the national training camp budget for 2020 was not very different from the 2019 budget. In order to work around the limited budget, the government needs to make a special effort to help junior and teen athletes follow in their seniors’ footsteps.

The Youth and Sports Ministry should continue to develop the “adopt an athlete” concept involving state-owned and private companies, in collaboration with other ministries and state agencies. This would help ensure the transition to independent sports associations. As long as their independence remains elusive, budgeting issues will prevail.

These are the various challenges national sports face as a result of its new paradigm in the hunt of world-class achievements. The first steps taken in 2019 should be cultivated, so that the Red and White flag waves above the world stage.