Manufacturers and winter sports authorities can rub their hands: the Beijing Winter Games have not yet started, but their impact on the practice of snow and ice disciplines is already being felt among the population. Chinese. A survey by the Chinese National Bureau of Statistics, unveiled on Wednesday January 12, reveals that the announced objective of converting 300 million Chinese to winter sports, announced when Beijing was awarded the Games in 2022, has become a reality . Since 2015, when the IOC chose Beijing as the host city for the Olympic and Paralympic events, more than 346 million Chinese have participated in winter sports activities. Chinese youth, in particular, seem to have fallen under the spell of skiing or skating: 82 million new practitioners are aged 18 to 30. The same survey reveals that almost 40% of respondents participated in winter sports at least once a year. The most keen, around 11% of respondents, practiced more than three times a year. China now has 654 ice rinks, an increase of 317% compared to 2015. The number of ski resorts, indoor and outdoor, reached a record 803, compared to 568 resorts in 2015.
