Carles Puyol with young program participants during the festival in Colombia

The ‘Sentimos deporte’ (We Feel Sport) project coordinated by Save the Children benefits 150 children in the Colombian Pacific community of Buenaventura (Valle del Cauca).

The FC Barcelona Foundation and Scotiabank Colpatria are working with the NGO Save the Children Colombia to implement the ‘Sentimos deporte’ project in the city of Buenaventura (Valle del Cauca) involving 150 boys and girls, the majority of whom are from Afro-Colombian communities affected by internal displacement as a result of the armed conflict in Colombia.

During a visit to the project, the former FC Barcelona player and world football legend, Carles Puyol, who was accompanied by the director general of the FC Barcelona Foundation, Marta Segú, a delegation from Scotiabank Colpatria and the Save The Children Colombia team, was able to learn more about the actions being carried out and chat to some of the children participating in the program and their families. Puyol also took part in a sports festival while he was there, treating participants to a motivational talk based on his experiences as an elite footballer.

A total of 450 children from the municipalities of Arauca, Tumaco and Buenaventura have had the chance to take part in the ‘Sentimos deporte’ project since 2022. The program focuses on helping them develop their personal skills through activities that promote resilience and psychosocial wellbeing and based on the use of the FC Barcelona Foundation’s SportNet methodology as a fundamental part of all the initiative’s actions.

Following the visit, FC Barcelona Foundation director general, Marta Segú, commented that: "For our Foundation, being able to implement initiatives in highly vulnerable communities such as these that are subjected to all forms of violence against children enables us to identify actions that will benefit the children and harness the immense transformative power of sport. With the 'SportNet' methodology we are able to improve their personal and social skills, as well as prepare them for a future of peace and hope.”

Scotiabank Colpatria president, Jabar Singh, also stressed that, for his organisation, through their 'Scotiabank Fútbol Club' sustainability and social impact platform, "sport acts as a transformative vehicle for vulnerable communities. Which is why, with the support of our parent company in Canada and that of iconic figures, such as Carles Puyol, we continuously strive to implement initiatives for the benefit of the entire population.”

Save the Children Colombia’s Executive Director, María Paula Martínez, further commented that "projects like these promote protective spaces for children and help them distance themselves from the dynamics of conflict experienced in their communities, as well as mitigating the serious violations to which they are exposed; 8,246 children and adolescents have been victims of forced recruitment by criminal structures since the signing of the Peace Agreement (Office of the Attorney General of Colombia, January 2023). Projects and alliances such as these enable us to transform this reality.”

The FC Barcelona Foundation was set up in 1994 to support children and young people from the most vulnerable social groups through the promotion of sport and values education, with the aim of contributing to a fairer, more inclusive society. The Foundation’s activities are formulated in line with the United Nations Sport for Development and Sustainable Development Goals programs. With the emphasis on a new integrated approach to action, the Foundation’s work focuses on the three core areas of education and protection, community action and health and emotional wellbeing, and is based on the application of its own in-house programs and methodologies. Sport is fundamental to all our programs as an essential tool for social inclusion and equity, with a particular emphasis on gender equality and diversity in all its forms. The Foundation currently benefits more than 500,000 people around the world.

Scotiabank Colpatria offers a broad portfolio of products for customers in the Corporate, Business, SME and Private Banking segments, as well as consumer and mortgage loans, among others, aimed at the retail sector. It is one of the main issuers of credit cards -including co-branded - and revolving loans. It has a presence in 22 Colombian cities, offers an extensive network of offices, correspondent banking and more than 700 of its own ATMs nationwide, more than 190 of which are multifunctional, facilitating online payments and deposits. The bank’s varied portfolio of products can be consulted via the company website, www.scotiabankcolpatria.com, its sales staff in its branches, or via the customer-services line, by phoning (601) 756 1616 in Bogotá or 01 8000 522222 nationwide.

Save the Children is a non-profit organisation that works for and with children in more than 120 countries. The organisation champions the rights and interests of children worldwide, putting the needs of the most vulnerable children first.

It has been working in Colombia for more than 30 years on a mission to promote child protection, education, health, nutrition, the eradication of child poverty and the provision of humanitarian support. The organisation responds to emergencies and also heads up sustainable development projects with communities in nine departments nationwide: Cundinamarca, Valle del Cauca, Cauca, Nariño, Arauca, La Guajira, Norte de Santander, Chocó and Cesar.