Q&A with Chen Weiqiang, Deputy Secretary General of the HAGOC and Deputy Mayor of Hangzhou Municipal Government.

Chen Weiqiang receives a certificate of appreciation from the Olympic Council of Asia after the HAGOC donated marks and other medical supplies to the council

Q: After you came to the HAGOC, you have traveled to a number of cities that have hosted major sporting events and studied their organizing work. Compared with previous Asian Games, what are the unique features of Hangzhou’s preparations this time? Could you tell us how Hangzhou will present the Asian Games?

Chen: Staging the Asian Games is a great event for Hangzhou, Zhejiang province and the whole country. The Hangzhou Asian Games will be the third held in China. The first two games, the 1990 Beijing Asian Games and the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games, have fully demonstrated the strength of our country, and people from around the world got to know China much better. With these two amazing Asian Games, we need to think and plan carefully about how Hangzhou Asian Games could do better. In terms of scale, the number of participants and events, the Asian Games is on par with, if not bigger than, the Olympic Games. For the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games, 482 events in 40 sports have now been confirmed, and a total of 482 gold medals will be awarded. Therefore, our goal is that the Asian Games will be an event with “Chinese style, Zhejiang glamor and Hangzhou flavor”.

Q: From the very beginning of preparing for the Asian Games, the staff members at the HAGOC have made great efforts at every critical junction. Unforeseen circumstances such as the outbreak of COVID-19 have posed new challenges. What do you make of these uncertainties?

Chen: On September 16, 2015, Hangzhou officially won the bid to host the Asian Games. On March 18, 2016, the HAGOC was formally established. During this period, relevant departments and staff did a lot of preparatory work, which also made us realize that we shouldered great responsibilities and this was a glorious mission.

The year 2022 will be a year full of major sporting events. The Beijing Winter Olympics and the Asian qualifiers for the Qatar World Cup will both be held in 2022 and events like the World Athletics Championships have also been postponed to 2022. The concentration of so many events is likely to distract public attention and have a great impact on athletes, whose training, competition and recuperation cycle will be shortened. In addition, in the context of the global economic downturn, the marketing of these events will probably suffer as well.

But I think the Hangzhou Asian Games must be and will be staged successfully as General Secretary Xi Jinping has high hopes for the event. He said that he believed Hangzhou could hold the Asian Games successfully, which is a great vote of confidence, and that the whole nation would be behind Hangzhou, which has furthered boosted our confidence!

Q: Running the 19th Asian Games successfully is a goal for the HAGOC. You have proposed to achieve the task in three aspects, namely “Asian Games for Sports Development, Asian Games for Urban Development and Asian Games for Brand Development”. What is their relationship?

Chen: The three aspects were put forward during the organizing process for the games, based on the overall attributes and positioning of the event.

First of all, the Asian Games is a sporting event and sporting activities are the event is for. Therefore, it is essential that preparations should be done thoroughly, venues should be built and operated properly, sports events should be organized to all satisfaction, and athletes should compete fairly for the best results.

Second, there is more than sports activities for a major sporting event like the Asian Games; the efforts and resources of a whole city are required, hence the idea of “Asian Games for Urban Development”. We often say that “staging the Asian Games successfully will further develop the city”. For Hangzhou, active social participation during the Asian Games will help promote the economic and social development of the city to the fullest extent, and enhance civility and health of the citizens.

Third, a high-level sports event, the comfort and convenience brought about by advanced intelligent urban infrastructure, and the eternal memories born in the Asian Games will all become part of the games’ overall brand, hence the Asian Games for Brand Development. Therefore, we should be fully aware of the legacy that the games will produce, continuously reap the benefits from the games and make it into a brand of the city, promoting its progress in the process.

In this way, we can obviously see that the Asian Games for Sports Development, Asian Games for Urban Development and Asian Games for Brand Development evolve progressively.

Q: Then Asian Games for Sports Development should be at the first level, that is, sporting events as the public commonly understands. So where are we in terms of venues and facilities preparation?

Chen: A total of 57 competition venues, 31 training venues and 5 Asian Games villages and sub-villages have been prepared for the Hangzhou Asian Games has. So far, the progress is very smooth, and it is planned that by the end of this year, more than 95% of the venues will see their exterior construction and the accompanying intelligent facilities inside completed. Each venue is a separate operational unit, a new command center, and we look forward to seeing the venues in full operation.

Q: The Asian Games is closely related to all of us. For example, the opening of several subway lines has brought convenience to our lives, and the Asian Games has promoted the economic development of Hangzhou. Some say that hosting the Asian Games will speed up the development of a city by five to ten years, as the Guangzhou Asian Games did in 2010. How can Hangzhou improve its social and economic development through the Asian Games?

Chen: The Asian Games is not only a sporting event, but also an economic endeavor. In the process of organizing the Asian Games, many economic applications will be involved. We have proposed the ideas of Smart Asian Games, smart industry, digital economy industry, internet industry, among others. It is the economic dividends conferred by the Asian Games that have helped form a unique industrial chain and system.

In addition, the preparation for the Asian Games also involves infrastructure construction, which is a process to promote economic development as well. In terms of economic effects, major sporting events usually play quite a significant role in spurring the economy. For example, the Japanese economy was in a slump before the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games. However, after the games, its national economy was greatly lifted. Indeed, Japan’s Shinkansen started operation at that time.

For a region or a city, events like the Asian Games have a similar impact on the economy. We believe that the Hangzhou Asian Games will stimulate the city’s economic development. Currently, Hangzhou’s annual GDP stands at more than 1,500 billion yuan. And the Asian Games will undoubtedly further boost Hangzhou’s economy.

Q: and Asian Games for Brand Development”. If “Asian Games for Sports Development” focuses on sporting events, “Asian Games for Urban Development” emphasizes urban development and enhancing people’s sense of happiness, then what kind of “legacy” can “Asian Games for Brand Development” leave behind for Hangzhou? What can be called the Asian Games legacy?

Chen: When we speak of “Asian games legacy” and “Asian Games imprint”, we are essentially asking what can we get after the games and how to carry forward such a big brand? This has both hardware and software implications. For example, in terms of hardware, thanks to the Asian Games, new subway lines are opened, Asian Games-themed tourist trains are offered, venues and facilities are built or renovated. In terms of software, the memories of the opening ceremony, for instance, will remain in the public minds for a long time to come. We are also planning to make a documentary or film about the Hangzhou Asian Games, recording the whole process of preparing for the event, and to build an Asian Games museum, which in turn could serve as valuable reference for our successors.   

Editor: Huang Yan