23,100 young people more active in Greater Manchester

Research released today by Sport England shows that there are now 45.2% of children & young people active for at least 60 minutes a day in Greater Manchester, which equates to 176,700 young people. This is a significant increase of 5.3% from the survey 12 months ago.

The trend is positive and more young people are moving more, however, we are still below the national average of 46.8%. This means that 214,700 children are not meeting the recommended guidelines of 60 minutes a day.

When the number of adults moving in Greater Manchester is added to this it totals;

-      1,924,580 residents moving which is bringing us closer to GreaterSport’s target of 2 million people moving by 2021.

-      70.2% of the GM population moving, ensuring we are on target to achieve the GM Moving target of 75% by 2025.

Greater Manchester is working together, through Greater Manchester Moving, to support and enable our young people to move more by ensuring we work on all the influences which impact how much they move during their average day, this includes;

-      Opportunities for children to safely walk, scoot or cycle to and from school.

-      More schools are providing students more opportunities to move during the school day by introducing The Daily Mile^TM into students’ days or including activity into academic classes like Active Maths.

-      Traditional competitions like the Greater Manchester School Games has changed focus to incorporate more participation events to offer opportunities for a wider range of children to be involved.

-      Schools are being encouraged to open their facilities to the public outside of the school day, whether this be playing fields or school halls.

-      Wider networks are seeing the benefits of sport and physical activity on young people to help reduce crime and increase young people’s confidence amongst other benefits.

-      Through the That Counts! Campaign we are promoting parents moving more with their children eg, dancing round the house, walk in the park.

-      Giving young people a voice in designing their own opportunities to be active.

-      Through programmes like Satellite Clubs, we’re supporting local sports clubs and youth provision providers to think about attracting a wider audience and ensuring more sessions are tailored for all.

Sara Tomkins, CEO at GreaterSport said;

“It is pleasing to see 23,100 more young people are moving more and therefore experiencing the physical, mental and social benefits that comes from activity.

But to see that over half of young people (55%) are not meeting the guidelines means we have more to do to enable every child in Greater Manchester the opportunity to be active and find something they enjoy doing, which will have a knock on effect on their overall health and wellbeing.”

Government guidelines recommend that children and young people should get 30 minutes of their daily physical activity in the school day and 30 minutes outside of school. In Greater Manchester, figures show that there has been a rise in children moving more outside of school over the last year, with 56.6% (up by 7.3%) doing an average of 30 minutes or more a day outside of school, compared to 38.9% at school.