Safeguarding the city's sporting facilities
Visitors and local residents continue to use Sarajevo’s restored Olympic venues for winter and summer sports, thanks to the efforts of the ZOI’84 Olympic Legacy Foundation.
The foundation owns and manages four of the venues that were used at the Sarajevo 1984 Olympic Winter Games: Zetra Olympic Hall (ice hockey, figure skating and the Closing Ceremony), Bjelasnica ski resort (men’s Alpine skiing), Igman Veliko Polje (biathlon and cross-country skiing) and Igman Malo Polje (ski jumping). It also owns the casino at Skenderija II Hall and some of its retail outlets.
Local people enjoy a range of sports at Zetra Olympic Hall, from archery to bowling, while visitors to Bjelasnica now have access to improved facilities, thanks to the extensive development work ZOI’84 has overseen there. This includes the recent installation of a new snow-making system and lifts. The resort’s users can also take part in summertime activities, another of the foundation’s priorities, and may soon be able to access the Igman sites direct from Bjelasnica, if plans to build slopes and lifts on the other side of the mountain go ahead. Summer and winter sports classes are available at Igman Malo Polje, including ski lessons for beginners, all of them organised by ZOI’84.
In managing and improving its portfolio of sites and making them available to local residents, ZOI’84 works closely with Bosnia and Herzegovina’s national winter sports federations and the country’s National Olympic Committee, which was founded in 1992 thanks to an initiative supported by the foundation. A public entity, ZOI’84 is largely self-financing, though it does receive funding from the government for major infrastructure projects. The IOC also provided it with funds to rebuild venues after the Bosnian War of 1992-1995, Zetra Olympic Hall in particular.
Prior to the war, ZOI’84 employed 4,000 people, but now has just 100 staff. It began life before the Olympic Winter Games, as a data collection and treatment company. It owned hotels, sports facilities and other properties across Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Croatia. After the Games, it was appointed the legal successor to the Organising Committee, taking over management of the Olympic venues.