The pilot covered France's High Performance Structure and its approach to ´badminton for all´. The MEP is a programme under the BASIS Programme and the goal of this programme is to enable Member Associations and BEC to share and learn best practices with each other. 

Florent Chayent, President of FFBaD, welcomed all the participants and the pilot session was conducted by Philippe Limouzin, FFBaD Technical Director, who was the main presenter and Jean Marc Serfaty, BEC Director (Chair of Sport for All Commission), who was the moderator.

The first session about the High Performance Structure in France contained topics as governance structure, training centre and player pathway. The second session about Badminton For All in France, where topics such as badminton in schools, Para badminton and gender equity were touched.

At this pilot session, 11 participants from 8 different countries (Norway, Latvia, Slovenia, Serbia, Sweden, Wales, Austria and Finland) participated. All participants also had the opportunity to discuss and listen to input from Christophe Jeanjean and Fabrice Vallet from FFBaD, who work with high performance in France, during the session.

From the participants
Andre Høidebraaten from Norway, one of the participants, had this to say about the pilot in France:

- For me it was a good experience to hear from the other countries on what they are doing to get the children to play badminton in the schools. The presentation of the high performance was interesting to hear because in Norway there is a pyramid that says that you need the width to get the best players. In France, the pyramid was turned upside down to show that this is important to work on getting that amount of players and not only the best players.

BEC continues to implement new programmes to help our Member Associations in developing badminton in their countries. The Sport for All Commission works closely with the Member Support Commission to enable such programmes to take place.

Jean Marc Serfaty, Chair of Sport for All Commission, has also shared his opinions about the pilot session in Paris.

- On behalf of Emma Mason, Chair of the Member Support Commission, we are both delighted to see the pilot session materialized in Paris. We are happy to hear the building story for the youth development and high performance programmes of the FFBaD, he said.

- From my side we found in this new programme a strong opportunity to share more than words and bring new ideas and activities. Further analysis of this pilot session will be done in order to know if we will proceed with this programme in the near future, he added.

For more information about the BEC BASIS Membership Exchange Programme, contact Tania Teoh at tania.teoh@badmintoneurope.com, BEC Development and High Performance Manager