High-level commercial performances staged
one after another, large auctions of cultural relics called in succession,
annual spring and autumn book fairs held?? These are just the cultural
life of Beijing, cultural center of China, where a large arena has
been set for people going in for deals on an extremely active cultural
market in recent years.
The several prolonged holidays every year have brought tremendous
business opportunities not only to tourism, communications but also
Beijing's cultural market. During the "Labors' Day" lengthened
holidays of this year, Beijing presented a total of over 100 splendid
performances. The tickets of more than 30 shows staged in Beijing
Concert Hall and Zhongshan Park Music Hall had been sold out even
before the "May 1" holidays. The vocal concert of "New
Beijing, Great Olympics" held in Beijing Workers' Stadium on
the evening of May 1 attracted nearly 60,000 audiences with ticket
price raised to 1,000 yuan for each. Besides, 1,000 and more fans
without tickets were found listening out of the stadium.
As capital of six dynasties in history, Beijing, rich in cultural
connotation, has several nationwide famous distribution markets
of cultural relics like Liulichang and Panjiayuan. Besides, several
large auctions of cultural relics are held here every year. The
most famous are spring and autumn auctions of Beijing Hanhai Art
Auction Corporation with a trade volume of as much as 0.1 billion
yuan achieved each time. Furthermore, Beijing has planned to set
up a Liulichang Ancient Culture Industry Park Zone and Tongzhou
Oriental Culture and Art Industry Park Zone in order to develop
Beijing's cultural industry and to build them into cultural commercial
centers of China.
Beijing's book retailing trade also enjoys a leading position in
China. Beijing Book Building and Wangfujing Bookstore located in
Xidan and Wangfujing, as two most famous commercial centers of Beijing,
have led this trade for their remarkable sales. It is learned that
Beijing Book Building's annual book sales hit 0.1 billion yuan while
Wangfujing Bookstore saw 500,000 yuan of sale each day during the
"May 1" holidays. Besides, spring and autumn book fairs,
a cultural name brand of Beijing already, which has been held for
10 successive years, have attracted not only thousands of Beijing
residents but also a great many from other cities of China. It is
reported Beijing's spring book fair this year has drawn a total
of 700,000 people and each booth, a little bit larger than 10 square
meters, can bring its owner over 10,000 yuan of income a day.
As pointed out by people concerned that Beijing has seen a booming
cultural market, and it is a necessary choice for Beijing to count
on culture to develop its economy and boost its cultural industry.
Nonetheless for factors of planned economy still exist alongside
a flourishing cultural market, further standardization and improvement
are still demanded for a healthy development of Beijing's culture
market.
(People's Daily 05/08/2001)
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