Chinese officials confident of completing preparations for a successful Beijing Winter Olympics

As the world is still being challenged by the COVID-19 pandemic and with China tackling sporadic outbreaks, preparations for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics have entered a critical stage.

As reported by China Global Television Network (CGTN), Chinese President Xi Jinping said he believes that China, with strong support from various parties, will complete all preparation work as scheduled to ensure the Beijing Winter Olympics a success.

President Xi made the remarks during his telephone conversation with President Thomas Bach of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

CGTN reports President Xi as stating that 'China has strictly implemented containment measures, overcome the impact of the pandemic, and actively promoted the steady progress of all preparation work, adding that at present, the construction of venues and infrastructure for the Beijing Winter Olympics has achieved phased progress'.

When Beijing won the bid in 2015, Bach said the 2022 Olympic Winter Games was "placed in safe hands".

Less than 400 days from the opening of the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing on 4th February, 2022, the construction or reconstruction of all the 12 competition venues have been completed despite the uncertainties and challenges brought by COVID-19. A high-speed railway linking Beijing and co-host Zhangjiakou is now operational, nearly one million volunteer applications have been received and the Games' pictograms have been released.

President Xi  added that China takes the preparation for the Beijing Winter Olympics as an opportunity to promote the popularisation and development of ice and snow sports and added that Beijing will make unique contributions to the international Olympic Movement.

According to a report by Renmin University of China last December, although the pandemic forced half of those surveyed with winter sports experience to cancel their sporting plans in this past season, 150 million people in China had engaged in winter sports at least once from 2019 to 2020 – half of China's goal to have 300 million participants.

The report also showed that the amount of people keeping a close eye on the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics news updates has increased steadily from 6.2% in 2018 to 10.4% in 2020. Some 70% of the participants had paid attention to the Games over the past three years through different outlets.

President Xi has attached great importance to the preparation work of the 2022 Winter Olympics. Last week, he inspected the venues and learned about the preparation work in Chinese capital Beijing and Zhangjiakou City in Hebei Province.

During his inspection tour of Shougang Park in Shijingshan District, the seat of the Beijing Organising Committee for the 2022 Winter Olympics, in February 2019, President Xi stressed the need ‘to stay committed to hosting the Games in a green, sharing, open and clean manner, and to complete all preparation tasks with high standards’.

Bach added that the IOC supports China's concept of hosting a green, inclusive, open and clean Winter Olympics and stands ready to work with China to ensure a successful and safe Games, which will not only realize the vision of promoting winter sports among the 300 million Chinese people, but also strongly advance the development of international Olympic Movement.

Image: Artist's illustration of the Beijing National Aquatics Centre showing what the venue will look like while hosting curling during the 2022 Winter Games. Credit: China Daily