Jamaica’s sporting industry is at a critical crossroads, on and off the field. As Jamaica approaches 75 years of work in the Summer Olympic Games, a major milestone, one must look strategically on the approach going forward.

In the absence of a national strategic plan for sport, leaders of football, cricket, track and field, netball, basketball and horse racing must sit and work with experts to do a few things:

Design a short-, medium- and long-term plan for each of their sport and determine how they can collaborate for critical, technical, financial and social programmes;

Develop a comprehensive commercial (money-making) plan to maximize the use of merchandise, memorabilia and events to keep established fans and win new ones; influence curriculum and educational content for secondary and tertiary institutions; explore the value of bilateral agreements to build capacity; agitate for an incentive-based plan for infrastructure development.

Those five key points, if supported and worked on the five leading sporting disciplines could change the fortunes for sport in Jamaica.

Football being the most popular globally, and dare I say Jamaica must be in a position to lead this charge; but while that is so, football leaders must show they can and/or work with those who can, to engage at the appropriate junctures for the industry to flourish.

The current leaders with two members of their team should sit in a retreat (weekend); facilitated by an expert team (not more than three) to plot the path ahead.

I am recommending this be done before the end of August this year (August 31 to September 3). Most of the major global competitions for those sports would have been completed by then.

Following this, the plan should be presented to the Sports Development Foundation (SDF); the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica (PSOJ), Inter Secondary School Sports Association (ISSA) and the Inter-Collegiate group for its buy-in and approval.

The inter scholastic, collegiate and national programmes of each of these sport would benefit greatly from this collaboration.

The recommendation for the facilitator is Whycliffe “Dave” Cameron, and he will select his two support staff to undertake this venture. The retreat will be funded by each of the sports through equal contribution.

Game on!

Editor’s note: Carole Beckford is a sports marketing and management specialist.