General Infomation

The Organizational Development Initiative (ODI) is an opportunity for long-term strategic investment in those organizations and their key people responsible for supporting athletes from the grassroots to the elite level. For a long time, athlete development relied on the success of top athletes to inspire persons with a disability to get involved, with the hope that a portion would have what it takes to reach the podium. Relying on hope is not an effective strategy, therefore the IPC is committed to investing in more reliable strategies and systems and recognizes the critical role National Paralympic Committees (NPCs) have in this area.

The ODI gives the IPC an outstanding opportunity to identify the current capability and capacity of NPCs and to track their progress across a continuum. In particular, it will capture their readiness to work with Paralympic sports to train and qualify their athletes for the Paralympic Games and provide them with the tools to improve.

To claim success, NPCs must acknowledge their roles and responsibilities, including their top priority which is long-term athlete development. To deliver quality results NPCs must invest in effective leadership, administration, development, high performance sport, marketing, and communications. There is no magic formula to create a top NPC, but there are many years of experience and good practices within the Paralympic Movement to learn from.   

Each year a select number of NPCs enter the ODI. The ODI is delivered by a team including IPC Management Staff and external consultants, with continual direction by the IPC Development Committee. For more information on the path of a NPC in the ODI, see the ODI Process Map .

Countries (year entered the programme)

• Azerbaijan (2008)
• Burundi (2007)
• Cape Verde (2008)
• Kenya (2008)
• Lesotho (2007)
• Morocco (2007)
• Namibia (2007)
• Palestine (2007)
• Tanzania (2007)
• Tunisia (2008)
• Turkey (2007)
• Rwanda (2008)
• Uruguay (2008)
• Zambia (2007)