Chapter 16: Sports Fitness Industry in China

In recent years, there has been increasing development in the national economy in China and the living standard of citizens has been enhanced significantly. With increasing income and improved quality of life, China has started to build a well-off society. The National Economic Operation Report released by the National Bureau of Statistics revealed that China’s annual gross domestic product (GDP) exceeded 99.0865 trillion RMB while GDP rose to 70,892 RMB per capita in 2019. Furthermore, China’s sports industry was worth 2,657.9 billion RMB in 2018. This realised approximately 1,007.8 billion RMB in added value, which contributed to 1.1% of the GDP (General Administration of Sport, 2018). In the sports industry, fitness and leisure activities were worth 102.8 billion RMB (National Bureau of Statistics, 2018). During the 12th Five-year Plan Period, the value of the fitness industry developed a strong upward tendency and contributed to the most to the sports industry’s income (Fan & Wang, 2017). Statistics have shown the fitness industry made 30 billion RMB recently (J. S. Zhang, 2019). It is expected to generate 1.5 trillion RMB in 2020, having grown steadily (Report on the Current Situation and Development Trend of Sports Consumption Industry in China and the World, 2019). Technology and home projects have become increasingly popular in financing the fitness industry (Table 9). With a preference for financing investments, the fitness industry has met thriving business development opportunities in metropolitan areas and small cities (Chen, 2016).