Monday January 1, at 20 p.m., Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, Minister of Sports and the Olympic and Paralympic Games, in agreement with the President of the Republic and the Prime Minister, lit up the Arc de Triomphe in the colors of the Great National Cause 2024 (GCN2024) that Emmanuel Macron has decided to dedicate to physical and sporting activity. The minister was accompanied by GCN2024 partners and players from the sporting world.
A double challenge
The choice of the President of the Republic to dedicate the great cause of the year, for the first time, to physical and sporting activity, responds to two challenges:
- the opportunity, in resonance with the Olympic and Paralympic Games, to put sport and its benefits (on the construction of individuals, self-confidence, social bonds, physical and mental well-being, etc.) at the heart of society ;
- the need to better fight the health emergency which results from three combined evils: physical inactivity (4rd cause of death worldwide according to the World Health Organization), the growing addiction to screens (one in 2 young people say they spend more than 6 hours in front of screens today) and lack of physical and sporting activity (France has 3 million more regular athletes than in 2017, but 40% of French people aged 15 and over still do little or no sport), which puts our health at risk.
A triple objective
To meet these challenges, the great cause will pursue 3 objectives throughout 2024:
- Encourage French people to do more physical and sporting activity, in particular by encouraging them to move or do sport 30 minutes a day as regularly as possible, but also by increasing the opportunities for share sporting moments across the territories, in tune with the Games (organization of solidarity races, inter-student and inter-company sporting challenges, village tours, beach buses on the coast in the summer of 2024, etc.);
- Mobilize sports stakeholders and all the country’s driving forces (elected officials, healthcare professionals, medico-social players, businesses and start-ups, event organizers, world of culture, etc.) to promote the benefits, values and place of sport in our society ;
– Focus on sport more than ever at the heart of our public policies, interministeriality and the Republican Pact, through the mobilization of new devices and means for sport at school, health sport, inclusion through sport, sports equipment and for the audiences who are currently furthest away from the practice (people with disabilities , students, women, elderly people, etc.).
A strong marker: 30 minutes of daily physical or sporting activity
To encourage the French to include more sport in their daily lives, and to adopt less sedentary lifestyles, the Great Cause highlights a simple, unifying benchmark accessible to all of 30 minutes of daily physical or sporting activity (APS), and the GCN2024 website (www.grandecause-sport.fr) will offer many ideas on how to do these 30’.
This objective corresponds to the standard recommended by WHO for adults and studies show that 30 minutes of moderate PSA per day reduces the risk of cardiovascular accident by 30%, for example. 30 minutes of PSA per day is also the recommendation disseminated as part of the National Nutrition and Health Plan since 2002.
Moving for 30 minutes a day, at all ages of life, everyone at their own pace, according to their desires and possibilities at the moment, it's simple, it feels good, when you get into it, your fitness comes back quickly, and it keeps you in good health for a long time!
This strong marker is the signature of the animated logo of the GCN2024 which will be projected on the Arc de Triomphe this 1er January evening.
An engaging and festive event, in all territories
The Illumination of the Arc de Triomphe marks the kick-off of a large series of significant operations each month, with awareness campaigns to the APS which will be broadcast before and after the Games and almost 1000 events putting sport in the spotlight which will be organized or certified throughout the country in 2024.
Among these operations, we can already cite the “Grande Dictée du sport” whose final will be organized under the Dome of the Institut de France on March 30, the Heritage Loto which will devote resources to the preservation and restoration of sites sports, the organization of "Days for a France in shape" which, in all regions, will combine conferences-debates on the ravages of a sedentary lifestyle and sports practice workshops, and the "Grande Collection" of used sports articles from individuals, for recycling and reuse purposes.
January 3 will take place the first GCN2024 labeled event, an inclusive tournament organized on the occasion of the Champions Trophy of the Professional Football League, in partnership with the Play International Association, Licra and the Foundation for Inclusive Sport.
A collective of sports “activists”
The GCN will also rely throughout 2024 on a collective of sports activists bringing together elected officials, institutions, businesses, associations, and on testimonies personalities from the world of sport (Tony Parker, Marie-Amélie Le Fur, Antoine Dupont, Estelle Mossely, Thierry Henry, Marie-José Pérec, Didier Deschamps, Amélie Mauresmo, Alexis Hanquinquant, Gaël Monfils, Selma Bacha, Ciryl Gane, etc.), committed actors (Thierry Marx, Marine Ltemporel, Michel Cymes, etc.) as well as influencers who will be keen, from tomorrow on social networks, to convince our youth to make the 30' of APS one of their good resolutions for 2024 !
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The Paris 2024 Games and the Great Cause will be complementary: the first will bring inspiration and impetus to sporting practice, the second will amplify popular mobilization and strengthen the legacy of the Games around sport for all.
With the illumination of the Arc de Triomphe, it is the building symbol of our republican unity which will this evening embody our ambition both to build the sporting nation that the President of the Republic calls for, and to make a nation through sport, in 2024 and beyond.
