Periscope

Sprint for gold

Sport needs government and community support, write Astrid Chang, Evelina Leung and Zhang Zheng

From windsurfing queen Lee Lai-shan to table tennis duo Ko Lai-chak and Li Ching, from cyclist Wong Kam-po to BMX racer Steven Wong, Hong Kong medallists are well known to the public. Yet, few citizens care about the territory's sports development, which brings those elite athletes to the medal podium.

Sports groups and players complain about a lack of facilities, financial assistance and welfare provided by the government to help them excel.

The government, however, says it cannot shoulder the responsibility alone. More private and commercial backing is needed.

“We cannot leave the sports sector to take full responsibility for its profit and loss,” Timothy Fok Tsun-ting, president of the Sports Federation and Olympic Committee of Hong Kong, told Varsity in an interview.

Mr Fok said more commercial participation could be sought to help promote sport and solve the money problem.

Insufficient government funding is a common grievance among local sports bodies, especially those small associations.

The Hong Kong Dragon Boat Team, for example, is in financial difficulties. Its members have to pay for their own basic equipment like tables and chairs.

The group though has its own training centre, the facilities and environment are far from desirable and behind standard.

“We mowed the grass, concreted the road and made the pontoons ourselves,” the team's coach Chan Hay recalled how they made the centre fit for training.

Mr Fok also expressed regret that the two medal-winning cyclists were never provided with a proper place for training.

As Hong Kong is going to host the 2008 Olympic equestrian events and the 2009 East Asian Games, that sparks concerns over whether local investment and preparations for international sports competitions are enough.

The government has geared up its promotion of sport in the community after Hong Kong athletes made high-flying results in the Atlanta Olympic and Paralympic Games in 1996, with Ms Lee winning the first Olympic gold for the territory in windsurfing.

A Sports Commission was set up in January 2005 to advise the government on the overall policy planning, coordination, monitoring and resource deployment of sports development.

The government emphasises raising the profile of sport and physical recreation in the community, coordination of the funding and training for elite athletes, and promotion of major sports events in Hong Kong .

“We (the government) provide the basics. If you need more, under the principle of shared responsibility, the National Sports Associations (NSAs) should also have initiatives to look for other resources to support their sports,” said Eddie Poon Tai-ping, principal assistant secretary for the Home Affairs Bureau.

The 74 NSAs under the Sports Federation and Olympic Committee of Hong Kong are responsible for organising and managing sports activities in their own fields. They hold competitions and training courses, and assist athletes in joining contests as well as training of coaches and umpires.

In the financial year of 2005-06, the government provided $116.3 million to the NSAs, $8.92 million to the Sports Federation and Olympic Committee of Hong Kong, and $97.3 million to the Hong Kong Sports Institute, a centre for training elite athletes.

“This is the size of the pie, and everyone wants to have a bigger bite of it,” Mr Poon said.

 ”And there are other areas competing for money from us, for example, medical and education. If you ask others, I bet they will say these areas are more important than sport.

“If they really want to have more, they will have to seek help from other sources. Look at this from the government's point of view. It's really difficult to provide everything the sports sector wants.”

To support the development of elite sports, different grants and financial assistance are made available to athletes.

The commercial sector has also backed some NSAs, such as the McDonald's Hong Kong Youth Football Scheme, the Bank of China's Hong Kong Badminton Promotion Scheme and the Hong Kong Bank Foundation's Coach Education Programme.

The government sees that the resources in society are yet to be tapped.

But Chung Chi-hung, president of the Hong Kong Dragon Boat Association, said it was difficult to find private funding because many companies would only give sponsorship to sports events that could help promote themselves.

His association receives just about one-tenth of its budget from government subsidies, much less than it asks for. To make ends meet, it has to take part in fewer international competitions or to postpone its projects on improving some of the facilities, Mr Chung said.

He suggested the government play a greater role in helping NSAs find private sponsorship.

Still, Mr Fok, the chief sport advocate in the territory, said the government should invest more in sport, as it had spent much more money on education, medical treatment and welfare.

“If people do more exercises, they will indeed become healthier,” he said.

Get exercising

Although many Hong Kong people pay attention to sport news and take part in football-betting, they may not find the time to do sports or exercise. A government survey in 2000 found that on average, each Hong Kong citizen engaged in sports activities for 1.3 times per week and each session lasted for 29.1 minutes.

Even when citizens do sports, they find that the fees and charges of public facilities are high.

“Booking a badminton court for $59 an hour is quite expensive,” said Chan So-king, a 43-year-old housewife who plays the sport with her friends twice a week.

“That means it costs me about one dollar a minute.”

She asked why the government did not offer special rates to the middle-aged group as it charged just half of the fees from the elderly, full-time students and the disabled for using the facilities.

“Instead of providing concessionary rates to students, why not give this benefit to middle-aged people? Students have to go to school. They cannot use the facilities during daytime,” Ms Chan said.

But Mr Poon said the government had already subsidised about 80 per cent of the actual costs of the facilities. “With regard to the subsidised rate, it is not costly at all,” he said.

The public venues for popular sports are always fully booked during prime time.

The usage rate of the sports ground, such as that for badminton and basketball, is over 70 per cent, according to the Leisure and Cultural Services Department.

However, Mr Poon admitted that some venues and facilities were of low utilisation because of the government's overestimation of public demand.

For instance, there are currently 81 squash courts in Hong Kong , but the utilisation rate in 2004 was only 36 per cent.

To solve the problem, the Leisure and Cultural Services Department has modified some of those courts into multi-purpose ones.

It also plans to introduce measures to increase the utilisation of other sports venues during non-peak hours. Details of the plan are yet to be announced.

In promoting “sport for all” that aims at increasing public awareness and participation, the government organises programmes to citizens of various groups including adolescents, the elderly and the disabled people, to improve their health.

It also encourages NSAs to set up sports clubs to hold programmes for the public and invites star athletes from mainland China and other parts of the world to visit Hong Kong to help boost the local sports atmosphere.

Mr Fok agreed that more exposure of sports players to the public could arouse interest. “The mass media should not merely cover the pop stars and models,” he said.

Ball games or video games?

Upgrading the profile and the quality of sports in Hong Kong should also hinge on teenagers in particular, he noted. The young people's recognition for the sports policy is vital to the long-term development.

He said academic pressure and other entertainment like video games and shopping tended to drive young people away from sports.

In fact, of the territory's eight higher education institutions, only the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the Hong Kong Baptist University make physical education a compulsory course.

To increase students' interest in sports, the Sports Commission suggests a campaign of “a sport for each student” and making physical education as one of the elective subjects in university entrance examinations.

It also recommends that the Education and Manpower Bureau should maintain sufficient physical education in the academic structures of the secondary and higher education.

The proposal indicates that physical education should take a minimum of five per cent of the whole teaching sessions and be featured in the liberal studies.

However, that whether those suggestions will be implemented is subjected to further discussion with the Education and Manpower Bureau.

In the meantime, Mr Fok said holding the 2008 Olympic equestrian events in Hong Kong would be a golden opportunity for changing the public attitude towards sport.

“I expect our society will be more united after the Olympics,” he said.

But local athletes have reservations of tearing down the Hong Kong Sports Institute centre to make space for the equestrian events. “I think holding the equestrian competitions in Hong Kong is for political aims rather than other purposes,” said Lo Tak-kai, a board member of the Handball Association of Hong Kong.

From 2007 onwards, athletes at the sports institute in Sha Tin will have to move to a temporary training ground in Wu Kai Sha Youth Village in Ma On Shan.

“It is very inconvenient because it is too far from everything,” said April Yu Kwok-sze, a Hong Kong Table Tennis Team player.

Tennis athlete Polly Lam Po-kuen said the facilities in Wu Kai Sha were “very decentralised”. “If it rains, we have to travel to indoor tennis courts, which are far way.”

Additional reporting by Peggy Chan and Stephanie Tong

The Hong Kong Dragon Boat Team faces financial difficulties...
Coni Tam

... and lacks an integrated training centre.
Coni Tam

Eddie Poon Tai-ping says it is difficult for the government
to satisfy the needs of all sports bodies.
Stephanie Tong


The Hong Kong Dragon Boat Team takes part in fewer international competitions
because of inadequate government subsidies.
Coni Tam

Equestrian events lack public support

Not many Hong Kong people have a grasp of equestrianism although the city is going to host the sport events as part of the Olympic Games in 2008.

From students to workers, housewives to athletes, all those interviewed by Varsity cannot tell exactly what the horse riding sport is. Some even mix that up with horse racing.

“I know nothing about the equestrian sport,” said Kathy Lo Yee-tin, an 18-year-old Hong Kong junior tennis team representative.

Yu Siu-ngan, 40, a marketing staff, said: “I can't tell if Hong Kong can organise the events successfully. I don't know much about horse racing.”

Many interviewees say they do not have confidence that the territory will be able to hold the Olympic competitions successfully.

“ Hong Kong is not capable of organising such a large-scale sports event. We do not have this kind of professionals,” said jewellery worker Tang Kit, 56.

Housewife Lai Oi-kan said she “just has some confidence” in the government. “I read from newspapers that Hong Kong does not have the venue and facilities for the events,” the 56-year-old Ms Lai said.

By holding the events in Hong Kong , leading sports advocate Timothy Fok Tsun-ting said it would help build up the Olympic spirit among the people and strengthen public interest in sport.

“That, in effect, may achieve the ‘participation of every citizen' (in sport),” said Mr Fok, president of the Sports Federation and Olympic Committee of Hong Kong.

It is a “rare chance” for Hong Kong to host such an international competition, he noted.

An executive committee member of the Hong Kong Equestrian Federation, Gerald Kuh, said the territory had adequate infrastructure including the equine hospital to hold the upcoming events.

However, little attention is paid to the sport locally and that hinders its development, Mr Kuh said.

He said the equestrian events were one of the “most watched sports in the world”.

To promote equestrianism in Hong Kong , both Mr Fok and Mr Kuh suggested more media coverage on the sport.

The competitions of horsemanship were first included in the Olympics in 1900.

The sport demands the rider and horse work together as a team, and men and women will compete on equal terms.

The Olympic equestrian events cover dressage, showjumping and eventing.

Dressage requires riders and their horses to perform a series of movements harmoniously and smoothly in an arena.

In showjumping, a more popular event in equestrianism, riders and their horses have to jump over a course of fences and obstacles in order within a time limit.

Eventing is a combination of dressage, cross-country and showjumping with each being held on a separate day. Contestants have to compete in each of the three disciplines. In cross-country, riders and horses need to cover a trail and jump over obstacles.