 | |
| Sport | Karate |
|---|---|
| Jurisdiction | Worldwide |
| Membership | 200 |
| Abbreviation | WKF |
| Founded | 10 October 1970; 55 years ago (1970-10-10)[1][2][3] |
| Affiliation | IOC |
| Regional affiliation | World |
| Headquarters | Madrid |
| Location | Spain |
| President | Antonio Espinós of Spain |
| CEO | Sara Wolfferdown |
| Vice president(s) | Jose Garcia-Maañón, Nasser Alrazooqi, Bechir Cherif, Gunnar Nordahl, Michael Kassis, Wolfgang Weigert |
| Official website | |
| www | |
TheWorld Karate Federation (WKF) is an international governing body ofsport karate with 198 member countries.[4] It is the only karate organization recognised by theInternational Olympic Committee and has more than a hundred million members.[5][6][7][8] The WKF organizes their Junior and SeniorKarate World Championships, which are each held every other year. The President of the WKF is Antonio Espinós, and the headquarters are located in Madrid, Spain.[9]
Karate was introduced toEurope around the 1950s byJapanesemasters, mainly from theJapan Karate Association (JKA).[10] In 1961, Jacques Delcourt was appointed President ofFrench Karate Federation, which was at that stage an associated member of theFrench Judo Federation. In 1963 he invited the six other known European federations (Italy,Great Britain,Belgium,Germany,Switzerland andSpain) to come to France for the first-ever international karate event, and Great Britain and Belgium accepted the invitation.[11]
In December of that year, six of the seven federations gathered in Paris, in what was to be the first European Karate Congress, with the aim of improving and organising karate tournaments between their countries. It was noted that the unification of the different karate styles was impossible, and so they decided to unify the refereeing.[11][12]
By 1963 theEuropean Karate Union was created, withJacques Delcourt voted in as President. The following year the first European Karate Championships were held, in Paris.
In 1970, the International Karate Union (IKU) was formed byJacques Delcourt in an effort to organise karate at the world level. Upon hearing this,Ryoichi Sasakawa, President of theFederation of All Japan Karatedo Organization (FAJKO), which later changed its name to theJapan Karate Federation (JKF), travelled to France to discuss the creation of an international governing body.[10][13] The IKU was quickly disbanded and a new organisation was formed between the EKU and the Japanese federation, and was called the World Union of Karate-do Organizations (WUKO).[14][15]
In 1985 the World Union of Karate-do Organizations was officially recognised by theInternational Olympic Committee as the official board for karate.[16]
The integration of several new organizations during the 1990s saw WUKO membership increase to 150 National Federations. Therefore, a new name that would more accurately reflect the size and scope of the organization was needed. The name of the first International organization representing sport Karate was thus changed to World Karate Federation (WKF) on December 20, 1992.[17]
The significant growth of WKF resulted in a consolidated organisation that fully represented the sport of Karate at the international level. This legitimacy was confirmed in 1999 when the IOC officially recognised the World Karate Federation as the sole governing body for the sport of Karate in the world.[18]
In August 2016 it was announcedKarate would be in the2020 Summer Olympics.[19][20]
The global membership of the World Karate Federation stands at 200 national federation members, spanning five continents.[21]
| Continent | Name | Abbreviation | national member federations |
|---|---|---|---|
| Africa | African Karate Federation | UFAK | 50 |
| Asia | Asian Karate Federation | AKF | 44 |
| Europe | European Karate Federation | EKF | 54 |
| Americas | Panamerican Karate Federation | PKF | 39 |
| Oceania | Oceanian Karate Federation | OKF | 13 |
 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
 Australia |  Cook Islands |  Fiji |  French Polynesia |
 Guam |  Nauru |  New Caledonia |  New Zealand |
 Papua New Guinea |  Samoa |  Solomon Islands |  Vanuatu |
 Wallis and Futuna |
Rules:[27]
Guardian Girls Karate (GGK) is a global project originally developed by theKoyamada International Foundation (KIF) and later transferred toGuardian Girls International. Launched in partnership with the WKF andUNFPA in October 2022 inLos Angeles, the project has been licensed to WKF since 2024 and is administered exclusively by the WKF and implemented locally through WKF’s authorized national federation members worldwide, in collaboration with GGI and KIF’s national chapters.[28][29][30]
National members of theWorld Karate Federation | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Countries, teams, association and federation actively joining WKF World Championships. | |||||||||||
 | Europe (EKF) | ||||||||||
| Asian (AKF) |
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| African (UFAK) | |||||||||||
| Pan America (PKF) | |||||||||||
| Oceania (OKF) |
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| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
