International Wheelchair Basketball Federation

The International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF) is the international governing body for the sport of Wheelchair Basketball.  IWBF is recognized by the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) as the sole competent authority in wheelchair basketball worldwide. International Basketball Federation (or FIBA) has recognized IWBF under Article 53 of its General Statutes.

History
The Stoke Mandeville Wheelchair Games, held in 1947, were the first games to be held and included only a handful of participants (26), and few events (shot put, javelin, club throw, and archery). The number of wheelchair events and participants grew quickly. Wheelchair netball was introduced in the 1948 Games. In 1952, a team from the Netherlands was invited to compete with the British team. This became the first International Stoke-Mandeville Games (ISMG), an event that has been held annually ever since. Wheelchair basketball, as we know it now, was first played at the 1956 International Stoke-Mandeville Games. The US "Pan Am Jets" team won the tournament.

In 1973, the International Stoke Mandeville Games Federation (ISMGF) established the first Sub-section for wheelchair basketball. At that time ISMGF was the world governing body for all wheelchair sports. In 1989, ISMGF accepted the name International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF) for its former sub-section. With this step wheelchair basketball began its journey for full independence and in 1993 IWBF was established as the world body for wheelchair basketball with full responsibility for development of the sport. Over the next five years IWBF membership grew in size and the federation configured itself into 4 geographical zones.

Members

Zones
IWBF studied several models before creating its current zone structure. Based on the number of National Organizations for Wheelchair Basketball (NOWB) with active programs at the national and international level it was decided that IWBF Americas and IWBF Europe could be the same as FIBA Americas and FIBA Europe. However, because of the limited number of countries with active programs in the rest of the world, IWBF chose to combine some regions to create better developmental and competitive opportunities within the zone. As a result, the last two zones of IWBF (2005) are IWBF Asia Oceania and IWBF Africa.

Before 2007 or 2005 Africa and west asian in one zone and east asia with oceania in one zone. 

Members in May 2022:

 IWBF Americas - Americas Wheelchair Basketball Championship - 20 Members
 IWBF Europe - European Wheelchair Basketball Championship - 35 Members
 IWBF Asia Oceania - Asia Oceania Wheelchair Basketball Championships - 26 Members
 IWBF Africa - Africa Wheelchair Basketball Championship - 17 Members

National Members
As of 2003, IWBF has 76 NOWB actively participating in wheelchair basketball throughout the world with this number increasing each year. As of 2021, IWBF has 95 NOWB actively participating in wheelchair basketball throughout the world with this number increasing each year. 98 in May 2022.

 IWBF Asia Oceania 26
 IWBF Africa 17
 IWBF America 20
 IWBF Euro 35

IWBF Asia Oceania
 Afghanistan
 Australia
 Bahrain
 Cambodia
 China
 Chinese Taipei
 Hong Kong
 Indonesia
 India
 Iran
 Iraq
 Japan
 Jordan
 Korea
 Kuwait
 Lebanon
 Malaysia
 Nepal
 New Zealand
 Oman
 Palestine
 Philippines
 Saudi Arabia
 Singapore
 Thailand
 United Arab Emirates

Africa
 Algeria
 Angola
 Burkina Faso
 Central African Republic
 Egypt
 Ethiopia
 Gambia
 Kenya
 Liberia
 Morocco
 Namibia
 Nigeria
 Rwanda
 South Africa
 Rwanda
 Tanzania
 Uganda

America
 Argentina
 Bolivia
 Brazil
 Canada
 Chile
 Colombia
 Costa Rica
 Dominican Republic
 Ecuador
 El Salvador
 Guatemala
 Honduras
 Mexico
 Nicaragua
 Panama
 Peru
 Puerto Rico
 Uruguay
 USA
 Venezuela

Euro
 Armenia
 Austria
 Belgium
 Bosnia & Herzegovina
 Bulgaria
 Croatia
 Cyprus
 Czech Republic
 Denmark
 Finland
 France
 Germany
 Great Britain
 Greece
 Hungary
 Ireland
 Israel
 Italy
 Latvia
 Lithuania
 Malta
 Netherlands
 Norway
 Poland
 Portugal
 Romania
 Russia
 Serbia
 Slovak Republic
 Slovenia
 Spain
 Sweden
 Switzerland
 Turkey
 Ukraine

Executive Council

IWBF is governed by an Executive Council that is elected at the World Congress every four years. Philip Craven (Great Britain) who had served as Chairperson of the ISMGF wheelchair basketball Section since 1988 was elected in 1993 as the first President of IWBF.

In 2001, Brendan Hancock was elected to the position of President of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) and retired as president of IWBF at the World Congress in 2002. Maureen Orchard (Canada) was elected as only the second president of IWBF at that same World Congress in Kitakyushu, Japan in 2002.

Classification 
In order to make the competitions fair, each player receives a point in regard their physical ability called class, from 1.0 which is the lowest class with the maximum physical disability to the 4.5 which is highest class with the lowest physical disability.

The person who performs classification called classifier. Classifiers have Bronze, Silver and Gold badges according to their knowledge and experience. Recently the classification rules made changes and have only two levels, namely the national classifier, the zone classifier and the International Classifier. 

Don Perriman (Australia) is the current President of Classification Commission

Kenneth McKay (Great Britain) 

Gold Classifier 

Gholamhossein Shahrabadi (Iran) 

Gold Classier

Toufic Allouch (Lebanon)

Wheelchair basketball national organizations around the world
Wheelchair basketball national organizations have developed in a variety of ways. Most started out the same way as IWBF, as a sub-section of a national wheelchair sport organization. As IWBF matured so did many of its member organizations and now there are several models that IWBF embraces within its membership. In Mexico the wheelchair basketball organizations are a part of their National Paralympic Committee(NPC). Australia is part of the Australian Wheelchair Athletes Ltd., and others are under the umbrella of a National Disabled Federation such as Bahrain who are part of the Bahrain Disabled Sports Federation. In the Netherlands wheelchair basketball is fully integrated into the Nederlandse Basketball Bond and in Canada the Canadian Wheelchair Basketball Association is fully independent. In all cases where a member is part of a larger federation the IWBF only recognizes the part of that federation responsible for wheelchair basketball.

Member organizations
Canadian Wheelchair Basketball Association
US - National Wheelchair Basketball Association
Australian Wheelchair Athletes Ltd.
Mexican - National National Paralympic Committee
Bahrain Disabled Sports Federation
Holland - Nederlandse Basketball Bond
Malaysia men's national wheelchair basketball team
Islamic Republic of Iran Sports Federation for the Disabled

Events
 Wheelchair basketball at the Summer Paralympics
 Wheelchair Basketball World Championship
 IWBF U23 World Wheelchair Basketball Championship
 Africa Wheelchair Basketball Championship
 European Wheelchair Basketball Championship
 Wheelchair Eurobasket
 IWBF Champions Cup
 André Vergauwen Cup
 Willi Brinkmann Cup
 IWBF Challenge Cup
 Kitakyushu Champions Cup
 Wheelchair basketball at the Asian Para Games
 Wheelchair basketball at the 2023 European Para Championships
 Wheelchair basketball at the 2015 ASEAN Para Games
 Wheelchair basketball at the 2017 ASEAN Para Games
 Wheelchair basketball at the 2022 ASEAN Para Games
 Wheelchair basketball at the 2023 ASEAN Para Games

References

External links
International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF)
European Wheelchair Basketball Championship-A Division  (Adana 2009/Turkey) 
Asia-Oceania Championship 2009
https://www.paralympic.org/sites/default/files/document/130612102726657_2013_06_Dato+Zainal+Abu+Zarin-website.pdf
 https://web.archive.org/web/20230704140007/https://iwbf.org/aoz/
 https://iwbf.org/about-us/zones/

Sports organizations established in 1989
Basketball organizations
Federation
International Paralympic Committee competitions