According to International Canoe Federation, Para canoe was featured with exhibition status under the name paddleability at the 2009 Canoe Sprint World Championships in Dartmouth, NS, Canada, and was given official status as paracanoe at the following year’s edition in Poznan, Poland.

Later in 2010, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) announced at a meeting in Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China, that paracanoe would make its debut at the Paralympic Games in 2016 in Rio de Janeiro. There were six medal events at the Games (three men, three women), all in the kayak category.

The success of this sport lead to Va'a boat making its first Paralympic experience at Tokyo 2020. The debut of this sport in Iran dated back to 1999, with the national championships delivered 10 years later in 2009.

Watch the introduction to Para Canoe on Paralympic TV.