BNA hoping to push netball tourism

By Morissa Lindsay

There is an innovative tourism plan in the works to take Barbados netball forward, says President Dr Carmeta Douglin as she revealed that they are hoping to invite Uganda here on Sunday, March 5, for the official Barbados Netball Association’s opening ceremony.

During an interview with Barbados TODAY, Douglin shared that the BNA would like to brand Barbados as a tourism destination and former Barbados Association of Netball Umpires president Mona Alleyne will chair a team to handle that aspect of the initiative.

“What is also new is netball tourism. We feel as though Barbados can become a netball hub for tourism and we want to brand Barbados as a netball destination. So, we really thought we should put a committee in place and that committee is going to be chaired by Mona Alleyne who is also a former BANU (Barbados Association Netball Umpires) president.

“The first thing we are hoping to have is Uganda for our opening ceremony on March 5th. It is almost finalized but we just have to wait on the final arrangement.

Then we are hoping to have an advertisement go out internationally to invite community teams to come to Barbados and play in the community. Not just at the national level but at the community level as well. Teams from Australia, United Kingdom, and we also want to capture teams from Africa and Asia,” Douglin said.

Douglin added: “I must say we have a lot of plans in place for 2023, we have kind of hit the ground running and we realize that netball is a full-time business and several people can’t do it alone. So, what we have done is basically formulate about 12 committees to help us implement the programme going forward.

“All of these committees are going to be working for a two-year span. The plan is that all of these committees will work closely with the executive to ensure that we implement strong, positive netball from 2023 right through.”

The BNA board is also looking at building a multi-disciplinary sports complex with its infrastructure committee chaired by Fred Clarke. However, Douglin acknowledged that these things required money and therefore she was appealing to corporate Barbados for financial assistance.

“What we are hoping to have here is a multi-disciplinary sports complex. So, we need to get corporate Barbados on board and transform the netball stadium, work closely with the National Sports Council and all the other entities to transform this into a multi-discipline where we can have volleyball, basketball and netball.

“The idea is to have a padded surface that will not cause injuries to players and then we have a roof as well in case the rain is falling or whatever.

“I know that it is going to be costly but we are hoping that some magic and stretch of the imagination will make it happen,” Douglin explained.

morissalindsay@barbadostoday.bb