A Timely Tribute

Today, on New Year’s Eve it is five years since the Danir Group launched International Expect a Better Tomorrow Day, an initiative to promote ideas that will contribute to a better future. Next year’s initiative, Heja Klubben!, highlights the invaluable contributions of clubs and associations to Swedish life. Active sports clubs and associations do a fantastic job and in many ways they are the arteries that pump the lifeblood through every part of the country, encouraging more people to become involved, so that association life can continue to grow.

Today, it is easy to take our clubs and associations for granted and a surprising number of people are unaware of the level of commitment required to make these organisations work. We also see signs that parents’ engagement in their children’s sporting activities is declining. While many seem to believe that they can buy their way out of their responsibilities, they miss the point that association life is built on voluntary commitment and effort. And it must be so if sports of all kinds are to be made available to everyone, regardless of their economic situation.

This initiative seeks to demonstrate the enormous benefits that Swedish association life provides throughout the country. We pay tribute to all those who give their time and effort on a voluntary basis: enthusiasts with a passion for their club who every day create rewarding leisure activities for children, young people and adults.

The intention behind Heja Klubben! is to spotlight the thousands of sports associations and clubs all over Sweden whose members unite, stimulate, integrate and develop individuals in all weathers, both as athletes and as people. We wish to increase awareness of their efforts and encourage more people to get involved in association life, so that it can grow and thus ensure that this unique popular movement can continue to benefit communities all over Sweden.

Heja Klubben! is intended to be both a tribute and an inspiration, providing clubs with a platform for the exchange of ideas about how they can meet the challenges they face, whether that be a table tennis club in Pajala or a basketball club in Ronneby.

“Far too many people take what sports associations do for granted. The engagement of adults in their children’s sports clubs is declining. We must change this attitude and provide association life with the support and the praise it deserves,” says Johan Glennmo, chair of the Danir Group.

“I don’t really know where I would be or what I would be doing today without my club. The sense of community and joy I get from meeting my teammates in the football team have really given me more strength and self-confidence, both on and off the pitch,” says Dimitrios “Dimmie” Rabotas, Special Olympics footballer who plays for Swedish club FIFH Malmö.

“We play a leading role in the community’s activities and the common future that we shape together for a better rural life. As an amateur sports club, we invest in children and young people. And our unique events for both elite athletes and a broad base makes it more enjoyable and meaningful to live in our part of the country,” says Karin Bångman, chair of skiing club Offerdals SK in Kaxås, of the significance of sports associations to rural life.

International Expect a Better Tomorrow Day
Danir and Sigma launched International Expect a Better Tomorrow Day on New Year’s Eve 2017. Today, the initiative is jointly run by the Danir Group. With International Expect a Better Tomorrow Day, Danir wishes to contribute to a more sustainable, equal, and fair society. The first Expect a Better Tomorrow initiative, Segerpotten, put the financial situation of women’s football clubs on the national agenda. During 2019, the initiative Funkisfonden highlighted the importance of physical activity for people with intellectual disabilities, while in 2020 the Haveriet initiative sought to disseminate greater knowledge about the poor state of our seas and their importance to us humans.

This year’s initiative has been Femmegineering, which set out to inspire more young women to pursue a technical education, among other things by highlighting female role models in the engineering professions to demonstrate just how sought-after and needed they are in the sector.