IOC president cites 2020 Agenda in framing Beijing's frugal budget

International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach highlighted the positive influence of the Olympic 2020 Agenda on Beijing taking a more frugal approach in its bid for the 2022 Winter Olympics.

Bach is attending the 128th IOC Session in Kuala Lumpur, capital of Malaysia, where the host city of 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games will be selected from Beijing and Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Boasting a sustainable and prudent plan to host the 2022 Games by using a majority of existing venues built for the 2008 Summer Games, the Beijing bid committee stressed that it complies with the 2020 Agenda, 40 reform proposals approved by IOC last December to cut spending on bidding and hosting of future Olympics.

"The 2022 bid is the last one before the 2020 Agenda was approved. Nevertheless, we can see already some significant effects," Bach said on Wednesday.

"Both candidate cities have optimized their approaches significantly after the approval of the 2020 Agenda, (building) discussions with IOC and evaluation commission.

"The most obvious effect is that costs for infrastructure (competition and non-competition budget) are down to $1.85 billion (Almaty) and $1.5 billion (Beijing) respectively. If you consider the fact that in this cost the Olympic Village is included, and how much the population will benefit for generations to come from this investment, (it's a worthy deal)".

According to Beijing's bid file, the operational cost of the Games would be expected to be controlled in $1.56 billion (at 2014 prices) while capital investment for competition and non-competition venues amounts to $1.51 billion (at 2014 prices).

Beijing keeps the budget relatively small by utilizing 11 existing competition and non-competition venues, most from the 2008 legacy, of the 12 needed for 2022.

"There you see the immense effect of Olympic Agenda 2020, you see the same effect in the operational budget which is below $1.8 billion in both candidate cities. I guess it will be profitable (for the 2022 host city), because of the high contribution by the IOC of $800 million plus for the organizing committee (as a Games preparation fund)," said Bach.

"If you combine all this, you can see even the bid for 2022, as the last bid before the 2020 Agenda, has already been positively affected by the new agenda".