Sport England has announced that £10 million of funding has been earmarked for projects to get more women enjoying sport.

Applications are now being accepted to apply for funding for projects that specifically target women from disadvantaged communities, and women who are mums.

Sport England research has shown that these two sectors of women are particularly in need of help getting active.

They have identified what they feel are the key barriers for these women: time constraints, lack of affordable childcare, transport, cost, friends to go with and body confidence.

They are looking for projects to fund that will eliminate some of these barriers.

Sportsister spoke to Jennie Price, Sport England Chief Executive, about the funding

Why has this funding been launched?

Taking up sport, and finding an activity you really enjoy, is something that everyone should have the opportunity to do. We know that women can face particular barriers to taking part in sport, and it is important we invest resources into understanding how best to overturn those. That’s why this themed round is all about encouraging innovative projects and ideas to come forward and help us make sport fun and accessible for women across the country.

Why have you earmarked those two groups of women in particular?

We wanted to make this £10 million work really hard and if we had opened up these applications to all projects surrounding women’s sport we know that we would have received the most enormous range.

We know that often the best applications tend to come from those in good areas, and from the governing bodies of sport, and we wanted to reach out to some unusual communities here.

So we thought lets find some particular groups of women who have got barriers to participation. We know that women with children under 16 don’t have much free time, but would like to do more sport. Our survey showed that 70% of those women would do more sport if they could fit it in and it was offered to them in the right way.

Women in disadvantaged communities have a hard time accessing facilities usually, there may be cost barriers for them and there will be transport issues so that’s what we are trying to overcome.

Why do you think it is necessary to have women specific initiatives?

I think that women experience sport in a different way and I certainly think you need to market and provide sport to women in a different way. Some women do competitive sport and love it, but they are the minority.

Most women that do sport do things like swimming, running and the gym which they do on their own, so that’s a big distinctive factor. They will also want to wear particular types of clothes, how they look is going to be important to them, so you have got to be prepared to configure the offer so that it works for the market.

Are you looking at teenage girls too or is just adults?

We focus on 16+ and while they tend to be very fit still at that age often they have stopped doing sport at 12, 13 or 14. We’d really like to get some girls back into the sporting habit while they are still young, because generally the figures show that if you hold people in sport, women too, till they are about 21, 22 they will often stay with sport for most of their adult life, whereas if they stop at 15 or 16 then it is very hard to get them back.

Do you have specific targets in participation that you hope to achieve through this funding?

We have one big over riding target which is to have a million people doing more sport by the London 2012 Olympics.

Are you looking for people who are going to be running national initiatives or is it a regional based funding?

It really doesn’t matter. I would like to see a mix of both. The minimum amount is £10,000 so actually you could have some quite small local projects. But what we will be looking for are some projects that have been very specifically designed with the women in mind. So if you have got a community group that have really thought about the project, talked to the local women about what they want, and what will get them participating then you will be in with a good chance of getting the funding.

Details of the Active Women fund, including the prospectus, how to apply and frequently asked questions, are available on Sport England’s funding website: www.sportengland.org/funding.

The closing date for applications is 3 February 2010.

Louise Hudson, Sportsister
The Women’s Sports Magazine