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Minister of Youth and Sports Eduard Novak said on Friday in Sfantu Gheorghe that the number of people in Romania who are constantly exercising or doing sports is extremely small, therefore he will get involved in the development of both professional and mass sports, agerpres.ro confirms.
"It is not only professional sports and Olympic medals that matter, but what matters a lot is how many children do sports, how children start in life and, of course, how many of them exercise, because for the time being Romania is faring bad: nationwide only 2 to 5%, we are lagging behind in Europe in that respect and, of course, food, we are among the first in terms of overweight," said Novak.
He said he accepted the position of minister because he saw it as an opportunity to "do remarkable things for the future of our children."
Novak added that his ministry will develop a strategy for Romanian sports that will show the direction in which to go in the coming years.
"We have a lot of work to do; we make the strategy for Romanian sports starting with priority sports to infrastructure, sports clubs. We must have a strategy that will show us actually where to go (...) We want to reorganise the Paralympic sports, which is very important as 500 gold medals are up for grabs in the Paralympic Games, which have the same value as the Olympic Games and I think will have a major social impact on people with disabilities. At the same time the coaching school and the education system matter, because at the moment it is not successful; under the current system we are disregarding the dreams and visions of our athletes and the sports of our children," added Novak.
