Project at school -- China

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Hi ttdaily been on here reading for number of years now. I'm doing a project for my school and need some help. I am comparing the participation figures of table tennis for the rest of the world and China. Does anyone have the participation of table tennis players in China and also specific regions such as Shanghai, Beijing etc? I would like to see how the numbers compare and how this influences sport dominance.

Thank you ttdaily
 
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I recall some top notch coach said something about Beijing with 2 million players of all age group
or is it Shanghai...

I also recall Germany has something like 50000 clubs

Thanks for your help Tony, 2 million just in Beijing, is it really that high? That's 10% of the province playing table tennis?
 

JST

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There are some interesting numbers claimed in this video: https://www.tabletennisdaily.com/forum/showthread.php?19294-Why-China-s-Dominance-Is-Unmatched

300m people playing WW (this is popular claim by ITTF and CTTA but I'm afraid they include all hobby players who just have the table in the garage or garden so it is rough estimate which can be off by 30%).

80m people playing in China (this probably comes from CTTA but I'm not sure if so many people are registered, it might be same estimate as above, probably little bit more accurate)

In Beijing all-year tournament 2.8m participants (That is probably the most accurate and the most stunning number from all three. If you extrapolate to other 10-20 large Chinese metro-areas with 10m+ inhabitants it can give you easily these 30-50m active people, only very few sports can beat this...)
 
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There are some interesting numbers claimed in this video:

300m people playing WW (this is popular claim by ITTF and CTTA but I'm afraid they include all hobby players who just have the table in the garage or garden so it is rough estimate which can be off by 30%).

80m people playing in China (this probably comes from CTTA but I'm not sure if so many people are registered, it might be same estimate as above, probably little bit more accurate)

In Beijing all-year tournament 2.8m participants (That is probably the most accurate and the most stunning number from all three. If you extrapolate to other 10-20 large Chinese metro-areas with 10m+ inhabitants it can give you easily these 30-50m active people, only very few sports can beat this...)

Thanks for these informations! In Beijing they have 2.8 million participants on record per year? Do you know what Shanghai's would be?

This is a lot more than my previous expectations.
 
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I would believe the numbers. I have played in Shanghai many times and Beijing once. As noted above, most are social players and aren't that good. Since they don't have empty garages or basements they play a table tennis halls where you rent by the hour. The costs are relatively cheap relative to other places like Japan.

It seems that everyone I meet in China will play table tennis socially. Sometimes we play after dinner after drinking Píjiǔ and Beijiǔ ( beer and a sorgum vodka ) so the play isn't that serious. So who are you going to count? Everyone?
 
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I would believe the numbers. I have played in Shanghai many times and Beijing once. As noted above, most are social players and aren't that good. Since they don't have empty garages or basements they play a table tennis halls where you rent by the hour. The costs are relatively cheap relative to other places like Japan.

It seems that everyone I meet in China will play table tennis socially. Sometimes we play after dinner after drinking Píjiǔ and Beijiǔ ( beer and a sorgum vodka ) so the play isn't that serious. So who are you going to count? Everyone?

Hi Brokenball, thanks for your msg here. Yes that's the thing I want to be as accurate as possible. Rather than social players I want to count active competitive players who play in leagues and clubs rather than very social players.

Any ideas on this figure? Thank you in advance.
 

JST

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JST

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some of these social players are pretty good - maybe better than your competitive players in some countries

That's true but pretty much impossible to "guess" the number, level (do you count everyone who ever touch the TT bat? Or just these who do it at least once a year? Or only those who have decent level? And what is that level?)

So the only thing you can somehow "count" with certain precision will be registered players under national associations. That is pretty easy for developed countries like those in EU, US, CAN... (at least those in Central Europe have pretty opened registers so you can find the information, although sometime only in native language). For countries like China, Korea and Japan I have no idea. E.g. are these metropolitan "leagues" and "tournaments" (like Beijing and Shanghai) somehow linked with CTTA? Or are these some separate registers? I would say these big associations will keep track on those numbers anyway so you should be able to get it but again probably just in native speaking sources. Good luck! (try to contact some active members here from HongKong, Japan, Korea, they might be helpful)
 
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That's true but pretty much impossible to "guess" the number, level (do you count everyone who ever touch the TT bat? Or just these who do it at least once a year? Or only those who have decent level? And what is that level?)

So the only thing you can somehow "count" with certain precision will be registered players under national associations. That is pretty easy for developed countries like those in EU, US, CAN... (at least those in Central Europe have pretty opened registers so you can find the information, although sometime only in native language). For countries like China, Korea and Japan I have no idea. E.g. are these metropolitan "leagues" and "tournaments" (like Beijing and Shanghai) somehow linked with CTTA? Or are these some separate registers? I would say these big associations will keep track on those numbers anyway so you should be able to get it but again probably just in native speaking sources. Good luck! (try to contact some active members here from HongKong, Japan, Korea, they might be helpful)

Thanks for the help JST I will do. Yeah I'm finding it hard to gather the statistics for China but what is posted here should work. If you have any more information please let me know.
 
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