Cricket South Africa (CSA) on Tuesday launched its transformation fund at the meeting of the CSA Chief Executives' Committee (CEC) in Johannesburg.
This was in line with the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) CSA signed with Sport and Recreation South Africa (SRSA) and the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (Sascoc).
“This is a vital strategic initiative,” commented CSA acting president Willie Basson, who is also chairman of the CSA Transformation Committee.
“Up until now, transformation has largely been seen as a moral initiative - doing the right thing to repair the imbalances of the past that are well known,” Basson said.
“But it has now become a strategic imperative if we are to maintain world-class standards and competitiveness over the next 20 to 30 years.
“We have excellent High Performance strategies in place that are reflected in the excellence of the Proteas and our other national squads but we need now to activate our total human capital base and to align our strategies in line with the changing demographic profiles across all our communities.
“More than 80 percent of our population under the age of 15 is ethnic African and it is very clear that it is here that we need to broaden our resources in terms of facilities and particularly in terms of opportunity for participants.”
Basson said the application of transformation funds would be done on a regional basis as each area had its own specific needs. Each affiliate would submit transformation fund projects and these proposals would then be evaluated by the Transformation Committee and funds will be applied appropriately.
“We will also have a monitoring system in place so that we can evaluate the progress made and reward our affiliates on a merit basis in terms of our strategic imperative,” he said.
“One of our key tasks will be to increase the financial capital available for this important project and we will be discussing this matter with stakeholders including the various levels of Government.” – Sapa