Media Releases

Sport and Sustainable Development: Setting a Research Agenda

May 10, 2017

Toron­to, ON – U of T’s Fac­ul­ty of Kine­si­ol­o­gy and Phys­i­cal Edu­ca­tion will be host­ing a research sym­po­sium on sport and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment on June 8. Bring­ing togeth­er lead­ing researchers from mul­ti­ple dis­ci­plines, the event will explore the role that sport can and should play in efforts towards sus­tain­able devel­op­ment, both inter­na­tion­al­ly and in Cana­da.

Recent­ly, sport has gained atten­tion as a poten­tial tool for achiev­ing envi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty objec­tives, includ­ing all 17 of the Unit­ed Nations Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals (SDGs). With­in this con­text, the aims of the sym­po­sium are to:

  • Address the ten­sions between sport’s poten­tial con­tri­bu­tion to the envi­ron­ment and its rather poor record to date;
  • Eval­u­ate the links between sport and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment;
  • Sit­u­ate sport with­in the inter­na­tion­al pol­i­cy agen­da of sus­tain­abil­i­ty and com­bat­ing cli­mate change.

The list of con­firmed speak­ers includes:

  • Kyle Bunds (North Car­oli­na State Uni­ver­si­ty)
  • Lyn­d­say Hay­hurst (York Uni­ver­si­ty)
  • Tanya Hal­sall (Uni­ver­si­ty of Ottawa)
  • Daniel Hen­hawk (Uni­ver­si­ty of Water­loo)
  • Kyoung-yim Kim (Boston Col­lege)
  • Brad Milling­ton (Uni­ver­si­ty of Bath)
  • Vicky Paraschak (Uni­ver­si­ty of Wind­sor)
  • Car­olyn Prouse (Uni­ver­si­ty of British Colum­bia)
  • Lar­ry Swatuk (Uni­ver­si­ty of Water­loo), and
  • Bri­an Wil­son (Uni­ver­si­ty of British Colum­bia).

David Miller, the pres­i­dent and CEO of WWF-Cana­da and for­mer may­or of Toron­to, will deliv­er the keynote address.

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For more infor­ma­tion and to reg­is­ter, vis­it https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/sport-sustainable-development-setting-a-research-agenda-tickets-34001217557 (please reg­is­ter before June 2nd). Reg­is­tra­tion for the event is $10, and includes lunch and refresh­ments.

Inquiries about the sym­po­sium can be direct­ed to Rob Milling­ton (r.millington@utoronto.ca), or Simon Dar­nell (simon.darnell@utoronto.ca).