A seminar on women’s football in France has revealed that the level of female participation across the game has increased as result of the sport’s feminisation plan launched by the country’s Football Federation (FFF) in 2012.

The event, held yesterday (28 January) in Paris, gathered together leaders of the French regional feminisation commissions, representatives of female football governing bodies and leagues and the FFF to evaluate the impact of institutional initiatives on women’s football.

The numbers presented reflected that, over the last three years, licenses for female players, managers, teachers and referees increased by 18.9%. The number of organisations exclusively run by women also increased by 8.1% (to 80 clubs in the 2012-2013 season) and the number of female teams by 17.7% (currently 1683 teams).

Since 2012, the initiative ‘Le football des princesses’ (The princesses’ football), developed to engage primary school girls in football, also registered a growth both in the number of classes by 49.2% (up to 1,338) and in the number colleges involved in the project by 55.3% (up to 250). To/by

Other initiatives, including the programme ‘La semaine du football feminine’ (Women’s football week) and the management initiative ‘Mesdames, franchissez la barrière!’ (Ladies, cross the barrier!), were also considered key elements in the growth of women’s football.

“Today, women’s football is starting to get the recognition it deserves and for that reason the Federation must continue to promote the sport among girls”, said the General Secretary of the FFF, Brigitte Henriques, in an interview.

The seminar was also used as a platform for regional bodies to share and discuss good practices.

24hr of Female Sport
The efforts of the French governing bodies in raising the profile of women’s sport will go further this weekend through the event ‘24h du sport féminin’ (24hr of women’s sport).

Activities across the country will gather together media outlets, sportswomen, activists and other organisations to celebrate female sports and promote its media coverage.