The sports clubs in Germany are warning of the massive impact of the energy crisis on mass sport.
“We currently have to assume that energy costs will triple or quintuple,” said Frank Fechner, chairman of the Eimsbüttel Gymnastics Association in Hamburg, the “SID”: “It’s an extremely difficult situation.”
First the corona pandemic, now the energy crisis: Clubs and associations fear another wave of withdrawals in view of the inevitable increase in membership fees. “It will be difficult weeks and months because the immense costs will have to be passed on to the members,” said Prof. Dr. Theodor Stemper, Chairman of the Bundesverband Gesundheitstudios Deutschland eV, the SID: “During the pandemic, the fitness and health studios lost an average of 20 to 25 percent of the members. There is a danger that there will be significantly more now. We are feeling new existential ones hardships.”
A possible energy lockdown, which the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) also urgently warns against, would be “a horror scenario” for Fechner that he does not want to imagine. “The social consequences of an energy lockdown in sport would be immense and it would not be possible to foresee what that would mean for children and young people and also for health in society in general. There must be no further setback.”
In the short term, the effects of the energy crisis are to be mitigated with banal measures such as lowering the temperature in swimming pools and sports halls or cold showers. In the medium to long term, the many outdated plants urgently need to be modernized and brought up to the latest energy standards. The federal government recently provided 476 million euros for the renovation of municipal facilities.
In order to master this crisis as well, Fechner is “convinced that we will need help, including state aid. On the one hand with operating costs, but also with the promotion of investments in energy-related renovations. The support programs must be expanded.”