NRL chief executive Todd Greenberg says the code will not be quick to follow in the footsteps of the AFL and launch a national women's competition.

On Friday night the AFL made history when the eight-team competition kicked off in Melbourne, but Greenberg said the NRL was not in a position to follow suit just yet.

"I think in this space we're spending a lot of time and energy on the Jillaroos to make sure our elite female pathway is strong," Greenberg said.

Currently Australia has about 40 elite female rugby league players.

"We have absolute aspirations to introduce more competition pathways for females, but in saying that we want to build from the ground up," Greenberg said.

The Jillaroos take on the Silver Ferns during the Auckland Nines tournament over the weekend. ( AAP: Darren Pateman )

"I don't want to start a competition without having the substance below it."

Female participation is the fastest-growing area of the game.

As of last year, 482,000 women were involved in playing rugby league, which is a 27 per cent increase on the previous year.

The code has aspirations of introducing a competition by 2020.

The start of the first AFL Women's match was full of hard tackling and ferocious energy. ( AAP: Joe Castro )

"That work is underway but I don't want to be rushed into doing something just because someone else is doing it," he said.

"We need to make sure out pathways are real and sustainable not just because it's topical now."

Greenberg said the league needed to make sure it does not "do things in halves", adding that they needed to grow a larger pool of talent before a competition could succeed.

This weekend the Jillaroos are taking on New Zealand at the Auckland Nines and later in the year the Women's Rugby League World Cup will be held in conjunction with the men's tournament.

AFL encroaching on country rugby league territory

One area that the NRL is keen to invest in immediately is country rugby league, where the growth of AFL has hurt the 13-man code.

Former NRL player Dean Widders grew up playing rugby league in Armidale, in a time when the sport ruled.

"No-one knew what AFL was — there were no posts, no-one had a football, no-one wore any of the clubs' colours, we didn't know what they were. We only wanted to know about NRL," he said.

But over the past 15 years interest in rugby league has waned while AFL and soccer slowly infiltrated the region and the number of rugby league clubs in the town has fallen from three to one.

"The game has struggled in this community, participation is the lowest it's ever been, other sports and other things have hurt it but we're trying to reinvigorate that through the local Indigenous club," Widders added.

Dean Widders says the attitude towards other codes in Armidale has changed in recent years. ( ABC News: Jen Browning )

The NRL has vowed to spend more money in country regions than ever before to help boost participation numbers in the game.

"In the next five years we'll spend more than we ever have in country rugby league; we're talking tens of millions," Greenberg said.

Greenberg travelled to Armidale this week as part of the NRL's annual Community Carnival and representatives from all 16 NRL clubs will visit more than 1,000 schools, holding 80 junior clinics in February.

The game's boss said he knows the NRL is "in for a fight" but wants to see country rugby league restored to its former glory, starting with the grass-roots level.