An innovative, 10-year partnership agreement that aims to achieve long-term stability of sports management for the advancement of diversity and inclusion in our society October 28, 2020, Osaka and Tokyo, Japan – Santen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (hereinafter, Santen), NPO Japan Blind Football Association (hereinafter, JBFA) and International Blind Football Foundation (hereinafter, IBF Foundation) are pleased to announce a 10-year long-term partnership agreement between the three parties for the early realization of an inclusive society.
● Background to the conclusion of this partnership agreement
JBFA and IBF Foundation are making various efforts to improve the quality of life (“QOL”) of the visually impaired. In 2019, Santen collaborated in support of the “IBSA Blind Football Asian Championships 2019” with an aim to popularize blind football, raise public awareness of vision impairment, improve people’s QOL and build a society in which everyone can lead fulfilling lives regardless of visual impairment.
In addition, this year marks the 130th anniversary of Santen’s founding and we have drawn up a new long-term vision and set three long-term strategies for realizing our “WORLD VISION – Happiness with Vision, which is the ideal world Santen aims for. Partnership with JBFA and IBF Foundation is positioned as an important action “Inclusion”, which is one of these three strategies. From this backdrop, the three parties have agreed to form a long-term partnership with an eye towards 2030 and solving the various issues surrounding “eyesight” on a global scale.
Furthermore, with greater understanding of the significance and importance of parasports for the future of our society, we will look to continuously promote the values blind football brings to society by providing long-term support to the operations of blind football competition organizations.
● Shared vision: Bringing down the walls between those who can see and those who can’t, turning society into a stage on which anyone can shine.
There are a number of issues that arise from the sighted and the visually impaired not fully understanding one another. With this long-term partnership agreement, Santen, JBFA and IBF Foundation will use blind football as the starting block to facilitate the societal participation of the visually impaired through a variety of channels including visually impaired sports, creation of new professions, and participation in innovations, and have set the following shared vision
Under this shared vision, the three parties shall set the following three goals and use blind football as the starting point in providing numerous platforms that encourage the mutual understanding between the sighted and the visually impaired on each other’s strengths:
1. Sharing experiences to understand each other’s differences and strengths
2. Create innovation in “seeing”
3. Improve the quality of life for the visually impaired
By doing so, we will look to achieve a sustainable and inclusive society where we all respect each other’s strengths and play an active role together regardless of visual impairment.
We support the principle of “Leaving no one behind” in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and we hope to contribute to the 17 SDGs as well through this long-term partnership.
** Vision illustration explanation download link **
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Comment from Shigeo Taniuchi, President and CEO of Santen Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd.
There are many issues surrounding the visually impaired. These include how the world is built on the premise that we can see, how there are few employment options and how there are lasting unconscious biases. This long-term partnership agreement could be seen as the first step towards the realization of our ideal WORLD VISION. Using blind football as the starting point, we will solve societal issues and build a world in which both the sighted and the visually impaired can interact and live in the same manner. We also intend to expand this partnership to a global scale.
Comment from Shiro Shiojima, President of the Japan Blind Football Association
We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Santen for its support in various ways, including sponsoring various international competitions and cooperating with the “Help Consultation Counter”. We are very excited to see the beginning of this innovative alliance to develop blind football together over the next 10 years. We sincerely hope that this partnership will be the cornerstone for the cultural integration of not only blind football but also parasports as a whole.
Comment from Eigo Matsuzaki, Representative Director of International Blind Football Foundation
Through blind football, this partnership will look to promote the sport and solve societal issues related to vision. Another big characteristic of this partnership is that its vision is a global one and isn’t limited to Japan. Having drawn this 10-year contract, we are excited by the possibilities it brings in terms of the wide range of mid-to-long-term activities we can take part in. We would like to thank everyone’s efforts to reach this point.
Under the shared vision of “bringing down the walls between those who can see and those who can’t, turning society into a stage on which anyone can shine”, the three parties will involve various stakeholders and work to realize an inclusive society.
About Santen
As a specialized company dedicated to ophthalmology, Santen carries out research, development, marketing, and sales of pharmaceuticals, over-the-counter products, and medical devices. Santen is the market leader for prescription ophthalmic pharmaceuticals in Japan and its products now reach patients in over 60 countries. With scientific knowledge and organizational capabilities nurtured over a 130-year history, Santen provides products and services to contribute to the well-being of patients, their loved ones and consequently to society. For more information, please visit Santen’s website (www.santen.com).
About NPO Japan Blind Football Association (JBFA)
The JBFA is the central governing body for blind football and low-vision futsal, and it works with the vision of “realizing a society where the visually impaired and the sighted mingle as a matter of course.”In parallel with activities to promote and strengthen competitions, the JBFA is developing diversity education programs for non-handicapped individuals that take advantage of the nature of sport. Awarded the 2018 Asahi Sports Award. For more information, please visit the association’s website at http://www.b-soccer.jp.
About International Blind Football Foundation (IBF Foundation)
IBF Foundation was established on January 11, 2019, with the vision of “Blind Football Can Eliminate Disability”. The foundation’s aim is to improve the quality of life of the visually impaired around the world by making blind football a sport widely played internationally and contributing to the organizational strength of national sports organizations. Through blind football, the foundation works to solve the three elements of disability (impairment, activity limitation, and participation restriction) as defined in the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health by the World Health Organization (“WHO”), by taking the following three approaches: (1) Intermediate support activities, (2) Cooperation with partners, and (3) Acting as an independent business.
