World football's governing body has dispatched "the updated bidding and hosting documents" to the member associations of Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Colombia, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa and South Korea, whose bid could yet be a joint project with North Korea.

They will have until December 13 2019 to submit their bid book, the signed hosting agreement, and all other hosting and bidding documents to FIFA.

Up until the bid submissions deadline, any member association wishing to join an existing bid will be permitted to do so, provided that it also submits a bidding registration to FIFA. 

FIFA is set to conduct official inspections to the relevant member associations in January and February 2020, and the appointment of the host(s) is expected for May 2020.

Last month, the Royal Belgian Football Association (RBFA) stated it is not looking to host the 2023 Women's World Cup, despite FIFA claiming the country had become the 10th member association to express interest.

As reported by The Brussels Times, RBFA spokesman Stefan Van Loock suggested that FIFA's announcement could be misinterpreted and that any bid for the Women's World Cup would be further down the line.

It was announced on July 31 that the FIFA Council had taken the unanimous decision to increase the number of teams taking part in the FIFA Women's World Cup from 24 to 32 as of 2023.

This led to the reopening of the bidding process.

The 32 nations will be split into eight groups of four at the finals, mirroring the format of the men's FIFA World Cup between 1998 and 2018.

The United States are the current women's world champions after defeating The Netherlands 2-0 in the final in France in July.

France 2019 was the eighth edition of the tournament, first held in China in 1991.