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China lags peers in recreation spending

Chinese people spend less money on culture and recreation than their counterparts in countries at a similar development level, according to the Report on the Development of China's Cultural Industry 2007.

The report, released yesterday in Beijing by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and Shanghai Jiaotong University, said Chinese people fall far short of the average among similarly developed countries when it comes to spending on culture and recreation.

"It is very improper," Zhang Xiaoming, chief editor of the report and deputy director of the academy's Cultural Industry Research Center, told a news conference.

China's 1.3 billion people make it the world's most populous country, and its per capita gross domestic product (GDP) exceeds $1,700. However, Chinese people spent less than $64 billion on culture and recreation in 2006, according to the report.

It has been observed internationally that when per capita GDP reaches $1,600, spending on culture and recreation generally accounts for 20 percent of total consumption.

In China, that would mean spending worth $256 billion on such goods and services, or four times the amount Chinese people spent last year, Zhang said.

The report attributed the spending pattern to several factors. For example, 1.15 billion people in China subsist on a medium or low income. After basic expenditures on housing, food and medical care, there is very little left over for culture and recreation.

The situation is compounded by the relative immaturity of the market for cultural and recreational goods and services, backward legislation and management and unsophisticated cultural products available in China, which have tended to curb such consumption, said the report.

However, amid all the gloom in the overall report, statistics about box office sales for Chinese movies stood out.

The report estimated that box office sales of tickets for Chinese movies exceeded 1.4 billion yuan ($179 million) last year, accounting for 55 percent of the total box office takings and representing the fourth straight year in which Chinese films have attracted more viewers than foreign films.

The report attributed the strong spending at the cinema to the improving quality and quantity of domestic movies.

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