ITTF President Petra Sörling wants to hold AGM gatherings and other official business meetings away from the the World Championships ©ITTF

Petra Sörling, the President of the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF), does not want to stage official meetings during the governing body's World Championships.

Last month, the body's Executive Committee selected Amman in Jordan to host the inaugural ITTF Summit between December 4 and 6.

The Summit will will include the 2022 ITTF Annual General Meeting, as well as meetings of the Board of Directors, Continental Council and Executive Committee.

Other activities - including keynote speeches and workshops on sustainability, education and diversity - are planned too.

Typically during a World Championships, like the team edition set to start on Friday (September 30), the ITTF would also hold its Congress and AGM.

However, Sörling admitted to insidethegames that arranging such major meetings with its marquee competition has its downsides which she wants to eliminate.

"To be very honest, to have professional meetings during a World Championships, not only here [in Chengdu] because of the pandemic, but also in the past, it was killing our staff," she said.

"It is very, very tough to make an event running at the same time as having professional meetings.

Petra Sörling admitted delegates find it "hard" to take important decisions if official meetings are happening during World Championships ©Getty Images
Petra Sörling admitted delegates find it "hard" to take important decisions if official meetings are happening during World Championships ©Getty Images

"And also, for the delegates, nowadays people are sitting with their smart phones watching matches instead of taking active part in the decisions, which is hard when your team or players are playing.

"Having the first Summit ever will not be perfect but it will be a start for us.

"From there we can calibrate how we will do in the next years to come."

Sörling raised the proposal of a summit after attending one in Sweden and called it a "big wish" of hers.

The possibility of staging a similar event in the next two years are limited as the next two World Championships hosts have been allocated with the AGM.

Durban in South Africa is scheduled to hold the 2023 World Table Tennis Championships while South Korean city Busan has been given the 2024 team edition after it was unable to stage it in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sörling is planning to organise an annual summit thereafter with sights also set on lower-scale summits in the mean time.

"In the bidding for 2025, there is one bidding process for the meetings Summit and one for the World Championships itself," she remarked.

"So if it is a success in Jordan, for the next two years we will try to make some kind of hybrid so we can have this feeling of a Summit."