The SAMOA Pathway’s Article 82 calls to recognize the strong capacity of small island developing states in sport and the use of sport as a vehicle to foster development, social inclusion and peace, strengthen education, promote health and build life skills. The Pacific Sport Ministers (2015 and 2017 Meeting) and the Forum Economic Ministers (2018 Meeting) emphasized the role of sport in achieving sustainable development in the region and called for the development of a Pacific Action Plan for Sport, Physical Activity and Physical Education, to maximize the contribution of sport to sustainable development in the PICTs.

It was also suggested throughout the consultation exercises that a range of stakeholders be included in the regional coordination mechanism for to develop and deliver the SPAPE Action Plan through formal and informal partnerships, including for example: Oceania National Olympic Committees (ONOC), Pacific Games Council (PGC), Organisation of Sports Federations of Oceania (OSFO), Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF), Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat (PIFS), UN Organizations, CROP agencies, university and tertiary institutions, media organizations, government and non-government stakeholders and media agencies in ensuring that the contributions of sport, physical activity and physical education are adequately integrated into the sustainable development agenda in the Pacific and embedded in national and regional policy. The initiative will therefore focus on mobilising relevant stakeholders to the development and implementation of the Pacific Sport, Physical Activity and Physical Education Action Plan; and providing assistance to the establishment of a regional taskforce and reference group to oversee the implementation of the Action Plan.

Throughout the consultations capacity building is one of the key areas that are associated with policy development. The initiative will focus on fostering information sharing, national and regional advocacy and capacity building programmes relevant to the SPAPE Action Plan.

Through series of consultations with regional bodies for sport and civil society organisations initiated by ONOC, Sport Matters and UNESCO in 2018, a number of priorities were identified to be included in the Pacific Action Plan for Sport, Physical Activity and Physical Education, namely; (i) policy development and capacity building (ii) regional coordination and consultation (iii) advocacy and communication (iv) monitoring and evaluation and (v) research and education. The initiative focuses on coordinating actions between participating agencies to facilitate the development and implementation of the Pacific Sport, Physical Activity and Physical Education Action Plan 2018 - 2030. UNESCO shall be responsible for gathering implementation updates from participating agencires and overall reporting of this partnership to the SIDS Platform while the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat shall be responsible for convening the regional taskforce and reference group as mandated by Forum Leaders.

UNESCO, ONOC, Sport Matters, Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat