Following the successful staging of the maiden tertiary basketball league and the return of their traditional summer camp, Youth Basketball Guyana (YBG) Co-Director Chris Bowman, stated that the organisation’s focus continues to be on delivering quality programmes despite the financial challenges faced.
This was disclosed during an exclusive interview with Stabroek Sport yesterday. The entire interview is featured below.
SS: How would you describe 2022 as a year thus far?
CB: “We have had a fairly successful year in as far as being able to reset, getting youth basketball development on track via our academy, tournaments, and the return of summer camps this year. The challenge is staying consistent in delivering safe and quality youth basketball programs in a COVID-active environment, which is the new normal. We are also extremely happy with the level of student and parent participation throughout this year, which is at an all-time high. More kids are getting involved in basketball across the country, and why not, it is second only to football in terms of popularity and mass participation. The consequence of this is that it puts tremendous strain on our meager resources, facilities, equipment, and coaching, which is quite small given the scope, quality of programs, and significance of the work YBG is doing for youth and national development.” “YBG as you know is a non-profit volunteer based organisation which depends largely on sponsorship and donations. For the last two years, G-Boats has been the anchor for our development efforts, enabling us to provide year-round programs for hundreds of young people in the midst of a major health crisis. In short, YBG the last three years would look very different without G-Boats. Our other significant partners are the National Sports Commission, who continues to ensure that facilities are available for training and development. Equally important is ExxonMobil Guyana, who was this year’s title sponsor for the NSBF, and is making it possible for us to implement a youth basketball development curriculum and end the year on a high. We also had Edward B. Beharry returned as a sponsor for the 12th year. And we also have a growing and important partnership with California 2 Guyana Basketball Foundation who sponsored our summer camp, and continues to support youth basketball through their sneakers drive and other athletes and coaches development initiatives.”
“Notably, it has been a challenge getting support from the local business community. Although we fell short of our program goals and have had to adjust our priorities, nevertheless, we are grateful for the support received from those partners who can see the connection between youth sports and human development, which drives community development. One of the biggest success for YBG this year was the Inaugural Tertiary Basketball League, but guess what, we didn’t have a sponsor for that tournament, so therein lies the challenge, and we are not getting the funding that is needed to really have the kind of breakthrough in basketball at the grassroots. We are always on a shoestring [budget], having to pick and choose, between the important and the necessary, which is not how development works. At the moment we are reviewing our business model, hopefully the outcome of that would put us in a more stable situation next year.”
“To be quite frank, corporate Guyana is doing very little for grassroots sports and youth development, and I am not talking about horse racing and CPL Cricket. Sure, do that if it is about profit, but how are you impacting real lives? But no one talks about this, so they collectively get a pass. There are a few that honour their community responsibility, but the big name companies do very little for those communities that cause them to have the big profit in the first place. Think about it, how many of the large corporations are supporting grassroots sports? That is something you should research, and let the public know who are supporting their communities and who are not. Just recently a local basketball summer development camp was organised in the community of Silvercity, Victory Valley, Linden. More than one hundred youths from the community benefited. It was the third basketball camp in Linden the past few weeks. You would think this would have been the perfect opportunity for big business to donate, but no, it is individuals, friends in the diaspora, and local people making a difference.”
SS: How does YBG plan to conclude 2022?
CB: “The next couple of months we will shift some attention to student-athletes and coaches development with the implementation of our Youth Basketball Development Curriculum and in October we plan to organise a major Student-Athlete Pathway Conference. We will close out in December with the return of Titan Bowl which will bring together the nine best U18 teams and also a Tertiary Knockout, to build on the success of the league format earlier in the year. There are some other development programs but we will have to wait and see if the funding will be there.”
SS: What are some of the major projects that YBG will be working on in 2023?
CB: “We are hoping to return to our regular calendar in 2023, in terms of development and tournaments. Girls’ development will also be on the front burner. YBG is determined to give more exposure to our top youth players, including scholarships. We are working on a few other major projects but we don’t want to jinx it.”
