Normalising Responsible, Sustainable Gaming

Oslo, 27-29 September 2023 – For this year’s sustainability and responsible gaming seminar, members from over 40 countries joined EL and WLA in Norway. The programme was packed with experts on the seminar’s two key focus areas – normalising responsible gaming, and adapting the sector to the new normal of our time, sustainability.

With keynote addresses from experts in their fields Dr Sally Gainsbury, professor in Psychology, Sophie Massin, professor in Economics and Lise Klaveness, President of the Norwegian Football Federation (NFF) the seminar aimed to present members with opportunities to approach topics such as normalising lower-risk gambling, the social costs of lotteries, best practices for diversity and inclusion and much more.

We were delighted to be joined by Dr Sally Gainsbury, Professor in psychology and Director of the Gambling Treatment and Research Clinic at the University of Sydney. Her research focuses on developing and evaluating policies and practices to reduce and prevent harm from gambling, as well as how technology could influence this.

“Problematic gambling is a public health issue. For every individual problem gambler, 6 to 10 additional people experience harm. Lower risk gambling is therefore essential for a sustainable industry,” said Dr Sally Gainsbury in her key note address.

We were equally pleased to have our second keynote speaker, Sophie Massin, professor in Economics at Lille University in France, join us. In her insightful address, she focused on the social value of gambling.

Our final keynote speaker, Lise Klaveness, was the first female president of the Norwegian Football Federation (NFF) as well as the world’s first female expert commentator on TV during a men’s World Cup in football. Her inspirational speech marked the end of the seminar.

”Football is biggest sport for girls, but there is no level playing field,” Lise Klaveness said.

The new EL Sustainability Guidelines were officially presented during the seminar (publicly available here). On a similar note, the question of which future steps the EL Environmental Initiative can take was raised. With Laura Da Silva, sustainability director at DigitalRG.com, and Carly Grace ALLEN, UX Designer at Norsk Tipping, moderating the event, we are hopeful that EL members were inspired to continue shaping the lottery industry around a new normal.

About the European Lotteries (EL)

EL is the European umbrella organisation of national lotteries operating games of chance for the public benefit. EL has members from more than 40 European countries including all EU Member States. The EU members contribute more than 20 billion EUR p.a. to the state budgets and the funding of sport, culture, social projects, research and causes of general interest. Unlike many commercial online gambling operators, EL members only offer gambling and betting services in the jurisdictions in which they are licensed by the respective national government. Website: www.european-lotteries.org, Twitter @EuropeLotteries, LinkedIn

SOURCE: European Lotteries (EL).