I am delighted to deliver our annual Activity Report at this Extraordinary General Assemblies in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.
2023 has been a hugely successful year for the FIA. I’m proud to say that we’re making considerable progress in line with my ambitions for our Federation.
Firstly, we’ve guaranteed the ongoing sporting success of our World Championships. Our competition series have continued to grow – with expanded calendars across a wide range of single seater, touring, and off-road categories. These Championships remain commercially successful and continue to attract strong and dedicated audiences around the globe.
At the same time, we’re boosting grassroots opportunities in order to double motor sport participation. This year, we held the biggest ever MENA Karting Cup (a karting championship for young drivers across the Middle East and North Africa) and supported the first ever African Karting Cup in South Africa.
As a knowledge-led Federation, we’ve continued to support learning and research opportunities for all our Member Clubs, our Championships, and other sporting stakeholders.
We’ve provided extensive training and educational opportunities through the FIA University and held our first ever FIA University graduation at the General Assemblies in Baku, Azerbaijan in December.
We have also launched a new United Against Online Abuse scholarship at Dublin City University and commissioned new research on the state of global online abuse (with initial results published at the General Assemblies).
Over the coming year, we will continue to expand the FIA University, offering even greater mobility and road safety learning opportunities through a single centralised hub.
Driving our commitment to a greener future, we’ve continued to research sustainable technologies for both our competitions and the broader mobility landscape. Our findings were published in an in-depth White Paper released in November 2023 and were presented by our team at COP28 in Dubai. This marked the FIA’s first time attending the Conference as an Observer.
On top of these achievements, we celebrated the 125th anniversary of our partner, the Alliance Internationale de Tourisme, with a commemorative book and a celebratory event at the occasion of the General Assemblies.
Moreover, the FIA’s teams and departments have worked tirelessly to shore up the financial future of our organization. Through their efforts, we have reduced the operating loss by €+7.0m compared to prior year, to €-0.8m. We have also established new processes to achieve further cost reductions in the coming year.
I would like to thank you for your ongoing support for all these initiatives.
I look forward to collaborating with you next year as we continue to drive progress.
Yours sincerely,
Mohammed Ben Sulayem
