Making the most of the Beijing Winter Games

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The government has approached the event as an opportunity to build an entire winter-sports industry from scratch. In addition to budgeting US$3.9 billion (S$5.3 billion) for Olympic infrastructure and facilities - a minuscule amount compared with the US$43 billion budgeted for the 2008 Summer Olympics - China has fostered economywide investment in winter sports. 

the Winter Olympics and the nationwide winter-sports push required significant construction in less economically developed areas....The Winter Games thus have become an instrument for reducing urban-rural inequality - one of China's most urgent economic problems.

In a period of heated political rhetoric and mutual suspicion, athletics and sports culture offer avenues for rapprochement.

Qn: Hosting major sporting events creates more problems than benefits. Do you agree? (Cam. 2005)