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Emanuela Karastoyanova 

€1 320 000 is the amount that the state will allocate to the Hellenic Rowing Federation for 2010. This became clear from a letter which the Chief Secretary for Sport Panos Bitsaktsis sent to the Managing Council of the Federation. The letter mentions that the maximum amount on which the federation could rely in the event that the amount originally allocated fails to meet all needs is €2 000 000. The money will be given to the federation gradually, keeping pace and conditions which the Ministry of Economy imposes and the federation for its part undertakes to submit to the General Secretariat of Sports Development a plan for the next five years. An important condition for disbursement of money from the state is proof of their rational and proper use, but also transparency in the functioning of the federation itself. 

The plan, which the General Secretariat of Sports produced for 2010 includes rowing, which is attributed to the ten sports of paramount importance for the country (along with volleyball, gymnastics, special gymnastics, recreational soccer, sailing, basketball, athletics and handball). By placing it in this category of sports the state is committed to support it profoundly and to take care of its further development and dissemination. Whether the amount, which this year is set to support, rowing in Greece, will be sufficient and whether it will succeed in ending the recent problematic relations between the governing council of the federation and the rowers themselves still remains to be seen. Let us recall that in early January the rowing athletes were punished with three months off from the national team because of absence from the last training camp, which the Federation had organized. With their absence from camp the rowers expressed their protest to the federation, which does not grant their requests for better training conditions, higher wages and better food.