The Polish Government has laid out a sports development strategy that is hoped will culminate with Warsaw staging the 2040 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
The presentation of the ‘Sports Development Strategy – Olympic Games Warsaw 2040’ is the latest step in Poland’s efforts to land what would be its first summer or winter Games.
The country’s most recent solid attempt came as Zakopane failed in the race for a 2006 Winter Olympics that was awarded to Turin, Italy. A Kraków-centred proposal was also launched for the 2022 Winter Games, but that failed to proceed past the local referendum stage. The country did show off its hosting credentials last year, with the European Games in Krakow-Malopolska.
In September 2023, Poland president Andrzej Duda announced that the country would pursue a bid to host a 2036 Summer Games focused on the capital, Warsaw. In August of this year, prime minister Donald Tusk said that his government would begin the formal process of applying to host the Summer Games, but this time targeting 2040 or 2044.
The former edition now appears to be the one settled on, following a presentation by sports and tourism minister Sławomir Nitras. The Olympics is intended to be just one part of an overarching national strategy concerning sport in Poland.
Nitras said: “We need to build a national strategy for the development of sports. This strategy is called Warsaw 2040, but in reality it is not a strategy for organising the Games, it is a strategy for changing Polish sports in such a way that the Games in Poland are possible.
“We do not have financial barriers. We have organisational, structural, certain infrastructural and social barriers that we need to overcome to move forward.”
Nitras said that, conservatively, the sports ministry will spend PLN 70bn (€16.09bn/$17.39bn) on sport by 2040, with local governments injecting a further PLN 120bn. He pointed out that Poland spends almost one per cent of public money on sports.
He continued: “This is really big money. So we can ask the question, not whether we can afford the Games, but why we couldn’t afford the Games until now? We have really good budgets, but we spend this money inefficiently and this is the task that lies ahead of us. In terms of money spent on sports from public funds, we are not far behind wealthy European countries.”
The key areas to be examined in the strategy include entities responsible for sports management, grassroots sports, competitive sports, science and academic centres, and investments in sports infrastructure, with the Olympic Games to be the “culmination of this”, according to Nitras.
Poland’s last sports development programme was prepared in 2015 and was in place until 2020. Since then, Polish sport has been operating without any strategic document. The ministry of sport and tourism has initiated proceedings to develop Sports Development Strategy – Olympic Games Warsaw 2040, with Nitras stating the goal is, after adopting the strategy, that negotiations can begin for a formal 2040 Games bid at the beginning of 2026.
While Warsaw is being looked upon as the centre of a potential Polish Olympics, Nitras said he envisions the Games as a country-wide effort. He added, according to Gazeta Wyborcza: “I am not a Varsovian, but Warsaw has the most consistent sports policy in Poland, it is the largest agglomeration and the infrastructure will be used effectively here.
“I dream that the Games will also be held in Wrocław, Kraków, the Tricity, Poznań, Łódź. It is possible. It is worth involving the entire country, building a sense of pride and participation. With the participation of cities, everyone will have the feeling that this is our common project.”
The first available edition of the Summer Olympics to bid for is 2036 after Brisbane secured the 2032 Games in July 2021. However, there is growing industry consensus that either India or Saudi Arabia will be awarded the 2036 edition.
Berlin has been linked with a bid for the 2040 Games, while last month, the Municipality of Copenhagen set aside funding to assess potential bids for a future Summer Olympics and Youth Olympic Games.