五輪費用は制御不能とオックスフォード大研究、ＩＯＣ猛反発

【ロンドンＡＦＰ＝時事】英オックスフォード大学の研究チームが、五輪開催国の負担する費用は地震や感染症の流行のような「重大災害」に匹敵し、大会の未来を守るには今すぐ対策を取る必要があると警告している。研究者は、現在の4年に1度のモデルは持続可能ではないと主張している。（写真は資料写真）
　学術雑誌に掲載された「極端への後退 五輪が破綻する理由（Ｒｅｇｒｅｓｓｉｏｎ　ｔｏ　ｔｈｅ　Ｔａｉｌ：　Ｗｈｙ　ｔｈｅ　Ｏｌｙｍｐｉｃｓ　Ｂｌｏｗ　Ｕｐ）」というタイトルの研究で、チームは１９６０年以降の五輪が全て予算をオーバーしており、当初予算の超過率は平均で１７２パーセントに達したことを明かしている。
　これまでの五輪で最もお金がかかっているのは、夏季大会では２０１２年ロンドン五輪の１５０億ドル（約１兆５８８０億円）で、冬季大会のトップであるソチ冬季五輪の費用はなんと２１９億ドル（約２兆３１８０億円）に及んだという。研究は、五輪の予算超過額は地震や津波、感染症の流行といった災害、そして紛争のリスク分布と同じように、無限に分散する可能性があると示唆している。
　筆頭著者で、オックスフォード大学経営大学院で大規模プログラムマネジメントを担当するベント・フリウビヤ教授は、国際オリンピック委員会（ＩＯＣ）は考え方を改めるべきだと促している。
　ＡＦＰの取材に対して、フリウビヤ教授は「ＩＯＣは収益にしか興味がない」「だから現在のようなあべこべのインセンティブ構造ができている。五輪が満たすべき基準をＩＯＣが定めているにもかかわらず、その費用を負担するのは開催都市と開催国だから、ＩＯＣの懐はまったく痛まないのだ」と述べている。
　２０２１年に開催予定の東京五輪も、当初の予算を大幅にオーバーしている。費用の見積もりは、最新の数字では１２６億ドル（約１兆３３４０億円）だが、新型コロナウイルスのパンデミック（世界的な大流行）の影響で１年先送りになったことで、会場や移動手段を確保し直したり、組織委員会の大勢のスタッフをもう１年維持したりしなければならず、莫大（ばくだい）な追加費用が発生することが見込まれている。
　研究の主張にＩＯＣは強く反発しており、チームがデータの提供を求めてこなかったと主張。さらに、大会そのものと開催都市や地域、国が行うインフラ整備という、二つの異なる予算を合わせて計算するやり方には「根本的に欠陥がある」と非難している。
　ＩＯＣは広報を通じて、「この研究は完璧に間違った印象を与えている。インフラ整備の予算は大会の４週間のためだけのもので、すぐに『償却』しなければならないように感じさせるが、そんなことはない。また、五輪のレガシーについても全体像から完全に抜け落ちているように見える」と話している。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2020/09/16-17:27）

Olympic hosts face crippling costs comparable to deep disasters such as earthquakes and pandemics and urgent action is needed to safeguard the future of the Games.
That is the stark warning from University of Oxford academics, who say the current model for the four-yearly event is unsustainable.
Their study, Regression to the Tail: Why the Olympics Blow Up, published in an academic journal on Tuesday, says every Games since 1960 has run over budget, at an average of 172 percent above the original budget in real terms.
The most costly Summer Games to date, according to the report, was London 2012, at $15 billion. For the Winter Games, Sochi 2014 tops the list, at an eye-watering $21.9 billion.
The findings suggest cost overruns are so variable that the possible outcomes for host nations stretch into infinity.
Disasters such as earthquakes, tsunamis, pandemics, and wars tend to follow this type of risk distribution, the academics say.
Lead author Bent Flyvbjerg, professor of major programme management at Oxford's Said Business School, is urging the International Olympic Committee to change its mindset.
The IOC is only interested in the revenue, he told AFP. So you have this topsy-turvy incentive structure where you have the IOC defining the standards that the Olympics have to live up to but they're not paying the bills for those Games because the host city and the host nation are paying those bills.
The Tokyo Olympics, due to take place in 2021, are the latest to wildly overshoot. The latest budget puts the cost at $12.6 billion but the postponement from 2020 to 2021 because of the coronavirus pandemic has thrown up a plethora of new costs, from re-booking venues and transport to retaining a huge organising committee staff for an extra year.
Flyvbjerg said some cities bidding to host the Games had dropped out once the potential cost hit home.
You have seen cities say 'we have changed our minds', which is hugely embarrassing for the IOC, he said. Rome did this, Boston, Hamburg.
This is what's going to force the IOC to deal with this and they are seeing this. They are up against a wall now.
They see there's a real risk that the Games will stop being held or will only be held in authoritarian regimes where a leader can say 'we want these Games and we don't care what they cost'.
The study's findings are strongly disputed by the IOC, which said researchers had not requested data from them.
It accused the authors of taking a fundamentally flawed approach, mixing two different budgets -- that for the Games and the infrastructure budgets of the city, region and country.
This gives the completely wrong impression that these infrastructure budgets serve only the four weeks of Olympic Games competition and must be 'written off' immediately afterwards, an IOC spokesman said.
This is simply not true. It also seems like the legacy of the Olympic Games is completely left out of the picture.
- 'Bloated whales' -
Flyvbjerg, however, is adamant that profound change is necessary.
One way to cut costs would be to only host the Games in cities that already have the vast bulk of infrastructure in place -- Paris, in 2024, and Los Angeles, in 2028, will benefit from elements of this.
He said an even more effective approach, which he believes the IOC would be unwilling to take, would be to hold the Olympics in the same city every time, giving the example of Athens.
A milder version would be to allow cities to host two or three times in succession.
You can deliver the Games at half the cost if you choose the right cities, he said. If you did that, many cities would say if we can do it for $5 billion or $6 billion, at that price it's a fair price for the world's biggest party.
I hope that Tokyo is going to be the last of these bloated whales where the costs are just blowing up all over the place and there's no proper control of costs and you're putting billions and billions of dollars of taxpayers' dollars at risk.