ASEAN Football4SDGs: Towards promoting the role of Sports in community building and development

In the context of the Southeast Asian region (ASEAN) promoting integration and building a comprehensive ASEAN community, the launch of the ASEAN Football4SDGs program has become a special highlight in the effort to realize the role of sports in building the ASEAN community and achieving sustainable development goals. This is an important program within the framework of ASEAN sports cooperation, especially with support from partners such as Japan.

ASEAN Football4SDGs emphasizes the role of football in particular and sport in general as a powerful tool to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in the ASEAN region. In particular, ASEAN Football4SDGs focuses on two important issues: Community development motivation (Using sports to promote peace , social cohesion, and healthy lifestyles in communities) and creating sustainable development (Contribute to solving social issues such as gender equality, physical education, inclusion for people with disabilities, and developing a new sports economy ).

In addition, ASEAN Football4SDGs also focuses on building three main groups of activities including: Research and development of toolkits on how to integrate sports – especially football – into the implementation of SDGs. This program has been piloted in three countries: Cambodia, Indonesia and Thailand, with a focus on school football and community football.

Not only stopping at training athletes, the core value that ASEAN Football4SDGs wants to emphasize is the role of football in social life to convey and spread team spirit, enhance gender equality, encourage people with disabilities to participate in sports, and at the same time raise awareness about the environment and community health.

Vietnam and Japan organize football exchange activities in the community...

This program marks a new approach for ASEAN – viewing sports as a means of human development, not just about performance.

Through training programmes and community models, Football4SDGs helps young people understand that playing football is not just about winning, but also about learning respect, cooperation and responsibility.

In the recent ASEAN Ministerial Conferences on Sports, especially at AMMS-8 and SOMS+Japan held in Vietnam, countries in the region have recognized the positive spreading effect of Football4SDGs. Accordingly, the Japanese delegate in his report at the Conference also said: The ASEAN Football4SDGs program has recently coordinated with a number of member countries in the Southeast Asian region to implement many meaningful activities in different forms and achieved positive results. Typically, from the community football model in Cambodia, training young coaches in Indonesia, to the "Green Football" campaign in Thailand, all show the great potential of sports in education and social connection.

In addition, Football4SDGs also contributes to improving sports management capacity in Southeast Asian countries, as well as promoting effective inter-sectoral coordination between sports, education, health and environment, and bringing practical values ​​to social life in each country.

The delegate from Japan also affirmed: With experience in organizing international sports events and consistent policies on sports development (for sports for all and high-performance sports), Vietnam can play a leading role in replicating the Football4SDGs model, turning sports into a bridge for regional and global integration.

On the journey towards a sustainable and humane ASEAN Community, sports – especially football – are demonstrating their power to connect across borders, bringing the region’s politics, society and culture closer together.

It can be affirmed that the ASEAN Football4SDGs program not only activates a regional declaration, but also inspires a new development mindset: sport is the foundation of human happiness and social sustainability. And in the next phase of ASEAN - Japan cooperation, countries in the region, including Vietnam, have committed to continue to coordinate, implement and effectively deploy ASEAN Football4SDGs programs to achieve higher results and bring great community values, contributing to building a sustainable ASEAN community.

Source: https://bvhttdl.gov.vn/asean-football4sdgs-huong-toi-phat-huy-vai-tro-cua-the-thao-kien-tao-cong-dong-va-phat-trien-20251020112204266.htm