Participants at a Fortune Global Forum sports roundtable in Beijing on Monday said that China's sports industry has experienced rapid development in the past decades, but is still full of huge potential as the Olympics approach and enthusiasm climbs.
 
"The service industry for fitness, sports competition and demonstration, as well as the production and sales of sporting goods, have grown very fast, and their growth rates are clearly higher than the economic growth rate," said Liu Peng, head of the State General Administration of Sport.
 
"The organization of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing will provide a new opportunity and new motive force for the all-round, coordinated and sustainable development of Chinese sports," he added.
 
The forum, on May 16-18, held two roundtables today on sports and culture, the first in its history. The sports meeting was chaired by executives from Sports Illustrated, a sister publication of Fortune. 
 
The roundtable "has built an international platform for observing Chinese sport" and "an opportunity for Chinese sports officials and athletes to learn from the world," said Liu during his speech.
 
The country's sports industry began in the 1980s together with the shift from a planned to a market economy, and has grown particularly vigorously in the past 10 years. There are now more channels of finance for sports development, and sports are encouraging new values and wealth in society.
 
The added economic value derived from the sports industry in Beijing, Shanghai and developed eastern coastal regions, according to Liu, accounts for a fairly big percentage of their GDP, approaching that of some developed countries.
 
The NBA has witnessed rapid growth; first appearing in China in the 1970s, its games are now widely broadcast with a loyal audience of millions. Its popularity reached a new high after the league picked Yao Ming, now Houston Rocket center, in 2002 and held NBA China Games in Shanghai and Beijing last October.
 
Although the NBA has made inroads into the Chinese market, Adam Silver, NBA Entertainment's president and chief operation officer, still expects further market expansion in the coming years.
 
Rick Dudley, president and chief executive officer of sports marketing agency Octagon Worldwide, focused on the need to meet the specific needs of the Chinese market. Using soccer as an example, he said Chinese fans tend to focus more on results than being loyal to a particular team no matter how successfully they play.
 
David Chu, chairman of Shenzhen's Mission Hills Golf Club, said that "On the road to becoming a sports power, China has begun to foster the world's largest sports population."
 
A survey by his company of 432 eight-year-olds in two public schools found that 20 percent had extracurricular training and 46 percent registered for special vacation courses. The annual expenditure per child on physical training was no less than 1,000 yuan (US$121), with some spending as much as 30,000-40,000 yuan (US$3,600-4,800).
 
Meanwhile, the three-day Formula One competition in Shanghai last November attracted 260,000 visitors and brought over US$300 million in revenue for the local service sector, said Yu Zhifei, deputy general manager of Shanghai International Auto Racing Course Corp.
 
(China.org.cn)