The 45th World Gymnastics Championships will start on Oct 3 in Nanning, a green city and the capital of Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.

This is the second time for the event to be held in China. Nanning and the entire autonomous region has been preparing for the event for years.

The city decided to apply to host the 45th WGC in 2011.

"Nanning has unique, incomparable conditions that make it one of the best candidates for the event," said Luo Chaoyi, an official in charge of track and field sports at the General Administration of Sports of China, during a press conference.

As the political center of Guangxi, Nanning bridges connections between China and Southeast Asia. On almost every map Nanning is marked as the first major stop from Southeast Asia to China. The city is a key transition port for commodities, services and tourist inflows, as well as a popular market for Chinese and Southeast Asian traders.

With these advantages, Nanning has gained ample experience in hosting international events. It held the China-ASEAN Expo, 11 sessions of the China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit, 16 sessions of the International Folk Song Art Festival and the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships.

The city is proud of its guest-friendly culture and an enthusiastic population that makes tourism prosperous.

As the hometown of a series of famous gymnastic athletes, including champions Mo Huilan and Jiang Yuyuan, Nanning has a traditional love of the sport. Many people practice gymnastics in the city's squares and many families send their children to training schools with the hope that they will be selected for professional teams.

Enthusiasm and experiences are not the only prerequisites needed to host a successful global sports event.

Busy preparations

Nanning must also meet software and hardware requirements, said local officials.

Yu Yuanhui, Party chief of the city, and Nanning Mayor Zhou Hongbo emphasized that the Championships was not just a sports event, but also a display of Nanning's image to the whole world.

"Our goal is to leave newcomers with a good image, and old hands with an even better image," said the leaders.

To do this Nanning accelerated urban construction since the day it was chosen as the host.

A new tower, with all kinds of modern devices, was built in the airport; a new train station, with extended high-speed railway networks, emerged in the eastern part of the city and flyovers appeared at various key traffic points. New green belts were also built to help clean up the city's air.

At the heart of the construction was the new gymnasium at Guangxi Sports Center, which occupies 35,800 sq m of land and can hold 8,700 people. With 2,982 sq m of competition space and 1,800 sq m of training space, 32 reserved seats for the disabled and 67 restrooms, the facility and its staff and volunteers are ready to serve athletes from any nation.

"Nanning is so well-prepared - the facilities can support a Championships even scheduled for tomorrow," Nicolas Buompane, deputy secretary-general of the International Federation of Gymnastics, said when he visited the center on Aug 11.

High benefit, low cost

The local government carefully designed the event budget and cut all unnecessary expenses to save taxpayers' money.

In several public speeches, Party chief Yu and Mayor Zhou expressed the hope to hold a "hospitable but also money-saving event".

The officials divided the budget into different parts, like building maintenance, communication, supplies, security and media contacts, and tried to control them separately.

For every special construction or service program, there were several enterprises competing for the bid, which lowered costs effectively. The event's total budget was 81.18 million yuan ($13.15 million).

To maintain balance commercial advertisements were introduced and the event was open to enterprise donations. By Sept 12, the organizers had cash, facilities and services worth 75 million yuan through enterprise donations, advertisements and ticket sales, with more expected.

"A global sports event is the best chance to cast influence and leave positive images on the whole world. We are confident we can make it happen," said an official.

zhangzhouxiang@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily USA 10/02/2014 page12)