Cotai outdoor venue opens to families and sports during downtime

The Social Affairs and Cultural Secretariat has announced plans to enhance the outdoor performance venue in Cotai by allowing public access during periods when no large-scale events are scheduled.

As noted by the Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture, O Lam, the performance venue has completed a year of trial operation.

Since its inauguration, it has hosted five major events, including a mega show, concerts, an award ceremony, and a water-sprinkling music festival, with four more events scheduled for the first quarter of this year. She noted that attendance has steadily increased from over 10,000 to nearly 30,000, effectively testing the venue’s capacity, crowd management, safety measures, and traffic impact.

“After a comprehensive year of trial operations and valuable feedback from various sectors of society, we are excited to introduce two new initiatives that will continuously enhance the effectiveness of the performance area,” the Secretary announced at a plenary session of the Legislative Assembly on Wednesday, adding, “This will address concerns about facilities, capacity, and event diversity.”

According to the authorities, during intervals between events at the performance area, the venue will be transformed into a simple three-on-three basketball court, a family sports activity space, and other facilities for public use. This initiative enhances the venue’s flexibility and overall efficiency.

The government will also take an open approach to evaluating individual suggestions for incorporating diverse activities, such as cultural and creative markets.

The outdoor performance venue in Macau, built at a cost of over MOP90 million, has hosted only a handful of events during its trial operation spanning more than a year. Despite the industry paying deposits for eight events in that time, four performances were ultimately canceled. As a result, the authorities announced during Wednesday’s session that a monthly rental scheme will be introduced shortly.

Deland Leong, president of the Cultural Affairs Bureau (IC), stated, “This move is intended to encourage organizers to avoid canceling scheduled events through more and better policies.” She explained that “the new 30-day monthly rental plan allows organizers to host more than one event, which should address the previous situation where entire events were canceled due to performers’ scheduling conflicts.”

The government has managed the performance venue as the operator during its trial operation period. However, according to O’s disclosure, this trial period will conclude by the end of the year, after which the venue will transition to market-based operations starting next year.

Meanwhile, the government has announced plans to establish a service center for the film and television industry. The preliminary plan divides the center into three major sections, namely, administrative services, industry resource matching, and industry cultivation and development.

As reported, this initiative aims to assist and facilitate better connections between young professionals in the industry and mainland China, promote cross-industry integration and market expansion, foster greater exchange and cooperation between Macau and mainland film industries, and enable young professionals in the film and television sector to better integrate into the broader national development landscape.