The agreement was signed by COE head Alejandro Blanco and Canary Islands President Fernando Clavijo at Elder Museum in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.

The signing ceremony featured representatives from the Spanish Videogames and eSports Federation and "eSports Talent Canarias", a project that places the Canary Islands as the first Spanish autonomous municipality to promote this kind of initiative in this field and hand-in-hand with the COE.

The COE wants to follow the new trend set by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which recently held a first meeting with the biggest stakeholders in electronic sports.

The IOC is aiming to establish a working group to explore how to interconnect Olympism with esports.

"The Olympic Movement is stepping up its engagement with esports because it recognises that they are played by millions of people of different ages," Blanco said following the signing of the agreement.

The event also included a space where visitors could experience esports games.

The IOC and the Global Association of International Sports Federations (GAISF) agreed to establish a liaison group on esports last month.

The decision was taken following the esports forum jointly hosted by the IOC and GAISF in Lausanne.

The exact composition of the group, which will include IOC and International Federation (IF) representatives, has not been confirmed but they will be given the chance to present at the Olympism in Action Forum in Buenos Aires in Argentina on October 5 and 6.

Further discussions will then take place at the IF Forum in Lausanne in November, while IOC President Thomas Bach revealed the topic will also be on the agenda at December's Olympic Summit.

Bach admitted that gaming featuring at the Olympics was not likely during his time as IOC President, due to end in 2025, but claimed that the "first step of a long journey" had been taken towards esports becoming part of the Games.