The World Rowing Federation (FISA) believe their strategic event attribution process, launched in 2017, offers a long-term approach to awarding events.

It is claimed the process will allow interested parties to indicate all of the events between 2021 and 2028 that they believe would support their long-term events strategy.

The process was aimed at recognising that regatta venues have benefited from significant investment by local, regional and national Governments, to bring them to a standard suitable for hosting international competitions.

A total of 36 events were open for bids in the period spanning 2021 to 2026, including three editions of the World Rowing Championships.

Serbia’s capital Belgrade is seeking to host the World Championships for the first time in 2023, having been a regular host of World Cup events.

Polish city Poznan, host the 2009 World Championships, and Trakai in Lithuania are also in contention.

The 2025 World Championships appear set for Australia, with Sydney and Perth the two cities listed as bidding.

So far, no bids have yet been lodged for the 2026 World Championships.

Kazan in Russia and Plovdiv in Bulgaria have both bid to host the Under-23 World Championships in 2022 and 2023.

The German city Hamburg have also bid the stage the latter.

Plovdiv and Trakai are also in contention to host the World Rowing Junior Championships in 2021, along with Varese in Italy.

Varese and Plovdiv have also bid for the event in 2022 and 2023.

Bids were also received for the three World Rowing Cup series regattas per year and the World Rowing masters event.

The European Championships at the senior, under-23 and junior level and these events for the 2021 to 2024 period are also included in the bidding process.

The submission of preliminary bids was reached on April 15, with 21 Member Federations submitting proposals from 31 rowing venues.

FISA revealed the German Rowing Federation put forward five venues for contention and the French Rowing Federation put forward three.

Regulars on the World Rowing event circuit like Lucerne in Switzerland and Bled in Slovenia were also included, along with Poznan, Plovdiv and Belgrade.

Olympic courses in Munich in Germany, Montreal in Canada and Banyoles in Spain are being considered, along with the potential to return to Penrith, the Sydney 2000 Olympic venue.

Bidders include an emergence of new venues such as Hjälmsjö in Sweden and Pretoria in South Africa.

The bidders have until June 30 to finalise all details and present final bids including financial guarantees.

A complete review of all bid documentation will then be done by FISA to ensure that all standards have been met.

All World Championship events will be attributed by the FISA Congress, due to place on September 2 in Linz in Austria. 

The World Rowing Cup events and the World Rowing Masters Regattas will be attributed directly by the FISA Council and announced at the same FISA Congress.

The European Championship events are due to be attributed by the European Rowing Extraordinary General Assembly later this year.