GolfPlus - Nov 19 Digital Edition (Nov 19) | Page 43

Feature
FROM MY DIARY…
NOVEMBER 2019
By Brandon de Souza
t the outset, I hope you and your loved ones had a great
Diwali and clocked up some wonderful rounds of golf
during the festivities. With an extended monsoon in a
lot of part of the country, courses are in great playing
conditions at the moment and the more you play, the
more you may enjoy so keep going out and relish the winter sun.
While the world talks about a slowdown in the game, the Golf
Industry Association has formalized a plan to take the game to the
smaller centers and make it accessible. For whatever issues BCCI may
have had, what they have done with taking cricket into the tier 2 and
tier 3 centers has been remarkable. That’s the model other sports in the
country should look to base their promotional activities on.
Knowledge sharing with such centers is truly essential if we are
to improve on the infrastructure and enhance talent. Through the GIA,
a two day Golf Festival has been planned in Lucknow on 8th & 9th
December 2019 to focus on the Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Bihar,
Jharkhand & Madhya Pradesh regions. The Times Group has kindly
consented to support the event through their database.
Delegates from all these states have been invited for the event
that will have top industry stakeholders exhibit their products and
services. Golf clubs of the region will have access to the best available
equipment including maintenance machinery, irrigation systems,
electric vehicles, clubs etc. Also for those looking to upgrade facilities
a lot of pre-owned stuff will be made available for purchase.
Really looking forward to interactions with various people
involved in the game from the region over a fun, competitive round of
golf which is being arranged at The Palms Golf Club & Resort, Golf
City, Ansal API followed by a networking dinner to meet the delegates
attending at the Lucknow Golf Club the same evening.
The next day, we will have a conference at the Lucknow Golf
Club where speakers representing various facets of the Golf Industry
including Turf & Green Machinery, Golf Carts, Drainage, Water
Harvesting & Playing Golf Equipment will make presentations and
both material as well as product will be on display.
Believe that such focused events like these are the way forward
to make the best practices available and break the ice amongst the
promoters, suppliers and the user.
Such smaller events could culminate into an annual event like the
India Golf Expo or the more recent Asia Pacifi c Golf Summit where
we bring in people from different regions of the country to discuss on
industry outlook topics like digitization, club management, agronomy,
hospitality, women & junior golf, golf tourism, personnel training and
skill upgrading etc.
With the introduction of designer tracks in India over the past 20
years, a lot of information is available here and as the world heads
towards 5G, I am quite sure a lot of what’s going on around the world
is accessible over different mediums. All the GIA is now focused on is
providing the right platform to discuss, analyse and ways to implement
them. The GIA will become the knowledge sharing platform for all
involved and in requirement of industry resources.
GolfPlus
NOVEMBER
2019
47