The meeting began by welcoming new representative panel members from Hong Kong, Korea Republic, Oman and Australia, before AFC Technical Director Andy Roxburgh gave a review on grassroots football, saying: “Our mission as the AFC Grassroots Panel is to promote football and provide people opportunity to play in a safe and enjoyable environment.

“Grassroots can literally change lives, and one of the main tools we have is the AFC Grassroots Charter.”

The Grassroots Charter is a development tool for Member Associations (MAs) to raise the quality of their grassroots programmes.

It identifies 20 performance categories such as grassroots competitions, fairplay, partnerships and personal development.

The Grassroots Charter is a development tool for Member Associations (MA) to raise the quality of their grassroots programmes. It identifies 20 performance categories such as grassroots competitions, structure, long-term planning and partnerships, and JFA has excelled in all criteria.

The importance of the grassroots is deeply rooted in the JFA and its 47 Member Football Associations  across the island nation of a 120 million population, where the focus on promoting and developing can be found in all levels in its football structure.

The Grassroots Charter is a development tool for Member Associations to raise the quality of their grassroots programmes.

It identifies 20 performance categories, such as grassroots competitions, fairplay, partnerships and personal development, which have all been met by GFA.

The grassroots philosophy of GFA is outlined within its Long-Term Player Development (LTDP) Model that provides guidelines for player development in seven stages, from the age of five to promoting optimal physical, emotional, psychological, mental, technical and tactical growth.

Participation growth of grassroots football has witnessed tremendous growth over the past 10 years. In 2016, GFA recorded 4020 participation of both boys and girls, almost doubled from their efforts in 2006.

BHUTAN

The AFC Grassroots Football Day celebration in Bhutan saw a huge turnout in the capital with over 1,700 participants taking part in the festival on May 15.

Organised by the Bhutan Football Federation (BFF), the football festival saw participation from boys and girls from 17 districts.

The annual national event was marked by teaching basic football skills to the participants as the students were taught dribbling skills and scoring tactics along with basic exercises required for football.

The Grassroots Charter is a development tool for Member Associations to raise the quality of their grassroots programmes. It identifies 20 performance categories such as grassroots competitions, fairplay, partnerships and personal development, and FAS has met all the criteria in the charter.

FAS’ attention on grassroots activities includes both boys and girls and in recent years, tremendous focus was given to women’s projects to encourage participation through various women’s events, competitions and programmes, such as the FAS Women’s Premier League, and FAS U14 Girls League, among others, as well as organising FIFA’s quarterly ‘Live Your Goal’ festivals.

AFGHANISTAN

The Afghanistan Football Federation (AFF) Stadium in Kabul welcomed over 200 children to celebrate the AFC Grassroots Football Day. A tremendous amount of effort and preparation took place a day before to rehearse for the event.

A total 35 local coaches participated in the celebration. They had also attended and passed a two-day workshop the previous day, which was conducted by AFF Grassroots Committee member Mujtaba Faiz.

The gold standard in the best MA category of the AFC Grassroots Charter Membership was given to The Football Federation of Australia (FFA), while The Chinese Football Association (CFA) were awarded the Silver membership alongside three other Member Associations (MAs) – Bhutan Football Federation (BFF), Hong Kong Football Association (HKFA) and Macau Football Association (AFM) who were awarded Bronze memberships.

The AFC Grassroots Charter is a development tool with the aim to raise the quality of grassroots programmes across the Continent. It identifies 20 performance categories such as grassroots competitions, fairplay, partnerships and personal development.