PARIS (Reuters) – The organizers of the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games announced on Friday that they had selected 45,000 volunteers from more than 300,000 applications, including 20% foreigners from more than 150 countries.
Open between March 22 and May 3, 2023, the application portal has received more than 300,000 applications from more than 190 countries. As announced since October 2022, 45,000 volunteers, including 20% foreigners from more than 150 countries, have been selected for the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
In comparison, there were initially to be 110,000 in Tokyo before the postponement from 2020 to 2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, there were 50,000 in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 and more than 70,000 in London in 2012.
“The number of volunteers mobilized for the Paris 2024 Games is in line with our needs and our project, with the desire that the volunteers have a real mission and that they can feel useful,” responded Paris 2024 to Reuters.
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“The sizing of volunteer programs depends on the number of competition venues and the number of sports on the Games program – which may change from one edition to another.”
If the volunteers have already been selected, the mandatory security screening which has not yet been completed could rule out some of them before the handing over of accreditations in May. The organization refuses to communicate the number of applications rejected for security reasons.
The Organizing Committee (Cojo) ensures that it has achieved parity and integrated more than 5% of people with disabilities.
The volunteers come from all French departments, including overseas, and “approximately 30% of them are under 25 years old”. “People over 90 are involved,” adds Alexandre Morenon-Condé, head of the Paris 2024 volunteer program.
Fifty percent of the volunteers mobilized for the Paralympics are also mobilized for the Olympic Games.
Volunteers undergo several training sessions before the Games, first online then in person a few days before the start of their mission.
“Like all volunteer programs, we are preparing to have withdrawals which are normal and justified,” explained Alexandre Morenon-Conde. “We have a few thousand people who have agreed to be replacements.”
“We are absolutely not worried about the subject” of withdrawals linked to the lack of accommodation for volunteers, he added.
The program begins on Saturday with the Volunteers’ Convention at Paris La Défense Arena, in Nanterre, with the presentation of the project by Paris 2024 President Tony Estanguet and the unveiling of the uniform designed by Decathlon that they will wear during the event.
(Written by Vincent Daheron, edited by Sophie Louet)
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