Financial crisis eroding Asian Games sponsorships

The Jakarta Post | Fri, 03/06/2009 5:45 PM  

Potential sponsors are turning their backs on next year's Asian Games in the Chinese city of Guangzhou due to the global recession, an official Chinese newspaper reported Friday. 

A dearth of sponsorships from Chinese exporters is hampering games preparations, including the construction of venues, although organizers hope foreign firms will pick up the slack, the China Daily said. 

Sponsors have so far pledged about 2 billion yuan (US$292 million), or two-thirds of the expected amount, the paper said. 

Organizers are facing "some difficulties developing stadiums and finding sponsors," the paper quoted Guangzhou Mayor Zhang Guangning as saying. 

A sharp drop in exports has battered companies operating in surrounding Guangdong province, the powerhouse of China's trade-led growth for the past three decades. 

It's not the only event suffering amid the downturn: The 2010 World Expo in China's commercial hub of Shanghai - expected to be the biggest ever - may also go without a U.S. pavilion as organizers struggle to raise $61 million from private sponsors. China is helping underwrite the event by building joint pavilions for poorer countries. 

The Asian Games, featuring countries ranging geographically from Saudi Arabia to Japan to Indonesia, comes two years after the Beijing Olympic Games, on which the central government lavished billions of dollars. While much of that was spent on infrastructure upgrades, Beijing has struggled to find uses for leftover sports facilities.