Print

Mail

wiki links

China begins sale of 2008 Olympic Games tickets

Tickets for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games went on sale globally from yesterday, with three quarters of the total 7 million tickets available to be sold in China and the rest overseas.

The tickets will sell for between 30 yuan (US$3.89) and 5,000 yuan, said a ticketing guide issued by the Beijing Organizing Committee for the 24th Olympiad (BOCOG). Income from the sale of Beijing Summer Games tickets will be an estimated US$140 million, Rong Jun (容軍), director of the Beijing Organizing Committee's ticketing sales department, told reporters in Beijing.

Beijing could receive 800,000 visitors during the 17-day event. The city is spending an estimated US$160 billion on public works including new roads, subways and stadiums for the Olympics.

"The pricing of the tickets will be within the reach of the general public," Wang Wei (王偉), executive vice president of BOCOG said in Beijing. "We want to ensure a fair and transparent system of ticket sales and to allow the broadest spectrum of people to attend the Olympics."

For the opening and closing ceremonies, 26,000 tickets -- or 41 percent of the 60,000 tickets available for sale -- will be sold to residents in China, Wang said. The public is only allowed to buy one ticket for each event, he said.

"China has too many people and we haven't any choice but to limit ticket sales for the opening and closing ceremonies," Wang said.

Overseas ticket sales will be handled by the individual country's national Olympic committee and its ticketing agent, Rong said.

For domestic sales, the tickets will be sold in three phases, Rong said. In each phase, residents in China can order the tickets either through the official ticketing Web site, call the BOCOG ticketing hotline or at designated Bank of China branches countrywide, he said.
This story has been viewed 1389 times.