It brings together 317,200 associations, accounting for 24% of all French associations (a stable proportion for 10 years). The average age of these sports associations is 29 years, but more than a quarter of them (28%) were established since 2001, which represents a significant renewal of this associative network and evidence of its dynamism.
Sports associations also stand out due to their frequent membership in a federation or grouping of associations: their membership rate is 80% (with 180,000 affiliated with federations that are members of the French National Olympic and Sports Committee – CNOSF) compared to an average of 53% among French associations.
Volunteering is vitally important for French sport.
The financial value of sports volunteering has been estimated at €7.5 billion by a study from the consulting firm Kurt Salmon for CNOSF. According to the CNRS, the 5.7 million annual volunteer participations in sports also represent the equivalent of 274,000 full-time jobs (compared to 189,000 FTEs for volunteering in culture or 171,000 FTEs in health and social services) – a significant impact on the operation of a sector employing 104,000 salaried workers. That’s 2.5 times more!
The economic weight of sports associations is relatively limited.
The average budget of a sports association is €29,350, whereas it exceeds €65,000 for all associations. Some sectors (health, social services, education…) have much higher budgets than sports (16% of associations in health and social services have budgets exceeding €200,000 compared to 2% in sports). Overall, sports represent only 10.9% of the combined budget of French associations. Employment is also widely scattered: sports account for 28.4% of French associations with salaried staff but only 6% of associative jobs.
