Håvard B. Øvregård

Senior Adviser in The Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederation of Sports, Norway. Håvard has worked for the Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederation of Sports (NIF) since 2007. He started as Project manager for “With Sports Against Homophobia” 2007-2010, and has since the end of this project been adviser on NIFs LGBTIQ-related work. From 2011 he has been responsible for NIFs work to prevent and handle sexual harassment and abuse, and since 2013 he has also worked with diversity, equality and safeguarding in general. His work includes giving advice to individuals and sport bodies in cases, as well as making structures for prevention and case-handling. Starting at age 19 as President of the Norwegian School-Student Union in 1995, he has had numerous responsibilities in youth and student organisations at national and international level. As board member of The Norwegian Children and Youth Council 1996-1998 and the European Youth Forum 1998-2002, as well as adviser for The Norwegian Ombudsperson for Children 1997-1998, he was especially occupied with children and youth’s participation in society. After being Bureau Member responsible for Equality and Human Rights in the European Youth Forum 1998-2000, this interest developed into a general interest in the mechanisms of inequality, discrimination and exclusion, and how organisations can work to counter these mechanisms.Håvard has broad experience from roles and responsibilities at international level, including at the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development, UN Special Session on Children, UN Expert Group Meeting on Global Priorities for Youth, the Pool of European Experts on Sexual Violence in Sports, and as speaker at numerous events on the topics of LGBTIQ and sexual harassment and abuse in sport, including the IOC Athlete Safeguarding webinar series for International Federations and the IOC Gender Equality webinars for International Federations. Håvard was also part of the IOC Safe Sport Team at the Youth Olympic Games in 2016 (Lillehammer) and 2018 (Buenos Aires).