The new ruling increases the entitlements that primary carers have, as they previously were only allowed eight weeks leave.

Paid secondary carer leave has also been increased from two to six weeks.

Netball Australia will now also provide provisions for child and support person travel for primary carers.

This means that any employee who is the primary carer for a child aged younger than 24 months who is required to travel for work purposes will have the travel costs covered for a child and a carer whether that be domestically or internationally.

"We want to ensure we are fully supporting our return-to-work parents and their families," Netball Australia chief executive Kelly Ryan said. 

"Netball has a leading parental leave policy for Suncorp Super Netball and Diamonds athletes, and we are delighted it now extends to our staff. 

"Our parental leave benefits have been enhanced to increase paid primary and secondary parental leave, while making progressive changes towards levelling the gender pay gap.

"This policy entitles staff to the same provisions as professional athletes, including supporting employees who are primary carers of young children and required to travel."

Also in the updated policy, employees are eligible to five days of fertility leave per year and increased paid surrogacy leave from four to eight weeks.

Netball is one of the leading sports for women and girls in terms of participation which is reflected in the governing body's workforce with 76 per cent of staff identifying as female.