Tasmania will be granted a provisional VFL licence in 2021 and receive extra funding but there are no plans to grant the state its own AFL team.
AFL boss Gillon McLachlan on Tuesday handed down the findings of a review aimed at rebuilding football in Tasmania following years of disunity and mismanagement.
The league has committed an additional investment of $1.4 million in 2019 and will fund the introduction of a Tasmanian team into the TAC Cup under-18s representative competition that year.
A provisional licence has been granted for a Tasmanian team to compete in the VFL in 2021 with the expectation of funding support from the state government and business sector.
The AFL will also create football administration hubs in the south, north and northwest of the state and revamp talent pathways in the hopes of addressing a slide in grassroots participation.
But McLachlan says a stand-alone Tasmanian team in the AFL remains a long way off becoming a reality.
"I think that (depends on) the success of the next three or four or five years," McLachlan told reporters in Hobart.
"Right now, Tasmanian football is fractured and fragmented. Our talent pathways are fragmented ... we've dropped the ball on game development.
"This plan deals with all of those issues but we need to deal with them and build the base and get a united Tasmanian football before Tasmania's really in a position to bid for a licence."
Asked whether a 10-year-old boy could one day aspire to play for Tasmania in the AFL, McLachlan was circumspect.
"I think they can," he said.
"They can dream to do that, and what we're trying to do is to put the building blocks in place today to deliver on a unified, sustainable Tasmanian future that every boy and girl knows they've got a good pathway to the AFL or AFLW.
"Whether that's playing for a Tasmanian team or one of the current 18 teams, that's a decision for eight or nine years' time for a 10-year-old."
The review was completed by a steering committee including Tasmanian-born AFL great Nick Riewoldt and Carlton coach Brendon Bolton.
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