Pengeproblemer i Norge

I think a number of people were caught offguard today when news broke that Norway was stopping all programming for its national hockey programs, and I can certainly say that I wasn't expecting that kind of news in mid-August. According to a report from NRK, Norwegian Ice Hockey Federation president Tage Pettersen confirmed the news that they are putting national team activities on hold for the rest of the year, and that includes everything except the Norwegian World Junior team that is expected to play in Gothenburg, Sweden in December. On top of that, five employees at the Norwegian Ice Hockey Federation were also terminated as a cost-cutting measure. Obviously, things must be in dire straits for the Federation to consider moves like this, but maybe it shouldn't be unexpected if we look at clues that show bigger problems in the Scandinavian country.

According to the NRK report, the Norwegian Ice Hockey Federation ran a deficit of more than nine million Norwegian krone (NOK) in 2022 which was three million krone higher than they had anticipated. There aren't many national ice hockey organizations that can absorb that kind of deficit while playing in the lower levels on the international stage, and hockey often finds itself behind more popular sports like cross-country skiing and biathlon in Norwegian society. Cross-country skiing is the country's official national winter sport, and that's clearly reflected in international competitions and at the Olympics based on the number of medals the country has won in those disciplines. As an example, Marit Bjørgen and Bjørn Dæhlie have won 34 Olympics medals on their own!

Starting from behind doesn't help hockey in the country, but there was a rather curious development back in January when the Norwegian Ice Hockey Federation withdrew its bid to host the 2027 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship. Norway, it was thought, might have the inside track as a country who was growing its program and could benefit from both the exposure and economic windfall of the World Championship coming to that country, but, according to Martin Merk's reporting on the IIHF website, the "reason for the withdrawal is the lack of funding from the Norwegian government."

One has to wonder why the government would make such a decision with Norway making waves in both men's and women's hockey as they look to continue to improve, but a Victoria Klesky report in Reuters showed that "Norway's wealth fund, one of the world's largest investors, posted a record loss of 1.64 trillion crowns ($164.4 billion) for 2022". That's a staggering amount of money lost, and it seems a large chunk of the losses came from their investments in Amazon, Meta, and Tesla which totalled approximately $15.5 billion. Overall, the fund stood at a loss of minus 14.1% for the year.

So Norway's overall wealth took a hit in 2022, and that seems to have led to cutting back in some less important government spending such as IIHF World Championship tournaments. Obviously, the country has a chance to rebound in 2023 with the pandemic lifting, travel and spending increasing, and things looking better on the whole for this year, right?

Well, not so fast. As of yesterday, Norway's central bank raised interest rates to 4.00% in the country in an effort to slow inflation which clocked in at 5.4%. As per Norges Bank, "If the currency proves to be weaker than projected or pressures in the economy persist, the policy rate may have to rise to more than 4.25%" in future economic decisions. In short, things aren't quite comfortable economically in the country, so it would seem that the Norwegian government will continue to be conservative in choosing what to fund. Hockey, unfortunately, is not in that plan.

National team coach Tobias Johansson identified two problems with suspending the national team programs. He told NRK,

"In the short term, our players and managers lose international experience, which we need to take the next step. Those matches and international breaks are invaluable for development. The long-term thing is that I believe we have built trust capital in the communities, which I suspect will see a decline."

He's not wrong on both counts. The national men's team will suffer as they'll miss out on games in November when Norway would play a national team tournament in Riga against Latvia and Denmark, and in December when they were to play Latvia and Slovakia in Bratislava. That experience is invaluable in identifying and evaluating talent on the team, making changes for the 2024 IIHF World Championship in Prague and Ostrava in May, and simply competing against other established foreign national teams.

The second part of his statement - "built trust capital in the communities" - is where Norway needs to continue its strong growth. By having the national teams do well on the international stage, more kids may want to try hockey. If minor hockey grows in Norway, there will be a larger pool of talent available for national teams in the future. For a country that only has 8618 registered players in its five million-person population, losing players at any and all levels would be devastating to the growth of Norwegian hockey.

The Norwegian Ice Hockey Federation will re-evaluate their position later in 2023 with the hopes of restarting their programs in 2024, but this seemingly unavoidable decision to suspend the national team programs will affect Norway's 12th-overall ranking on the men's side of the game and the 13th-overall ranking on the women's side of the game. By not having either national team playing or practicing, they'll fall behind other countries and it's hard to see them throwing enough money in to make up the difference. If the pause in programs prompts kids to take up other less expensive sports, Norway may not recover for years.

I'm not blaming the Norwegian government for taking care of their citizens by funding programs that will benefit the majority as opposed to 8600 hockey players, but erasing an entire season of hockey for its national teams will negatively affect those programs. It's fair to be unhappy that Norway cut funding to the Norwegian Ice Hockey Federation, but it seems the greater good won out in this one when weighing the needs of five million people to those of 8600 people.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!