Jacqueline French (right), Senior PR Manager of Visit London, and Chloe Couchman, Business & Major Events Communications Manager of Visit London [Photo: CRIENGLISH.com]

London is gearing up for its preparation of the 2012 Olympics by hosting all kinds of competitions and warm-up events. The city's events industry has promised fair pricing and practice in the run-up to the Games in an attempt to fend off a "pre-Olympic symptom". Our London correspondent Tu Yun reports.

Reporter:

In the lead-up to the London Olympics, the city is playing host to a slew of major events in a bid to test its hosting capacity.

Jacqueline French is Senior PR Manager of Visit London, the city's official convention bureau.

"The NBA just announced two weeks ago that it would bring its first ever league game outside from the US to London. We're going to have the first one in March next year. We've also started to host a lot more sports business events as well. We've got the Global Sport Summit, which is hosted by the Economist. That really brings in the top 100 sports representatives from all over the world. We're also hosting SportAccord, which is one of the biggest sports business conferences. That's going to take place in April."

Olympic host cities usually experience a downturn in tourism mainly due to fears that the prices of their hotels, restaurants and conference venues would go up ahead of the Olympics.

Chloe Couchman, Business & Major Events Communications Manager of Visit London, says major players of the city's events industry have signed a voluntary pact against over-inflation.

"Throughout 2012, they're not going to hike their prices just because it's the Olympic year and we're the Olympic city. We're really fortunate we've had nearly 500 people sign up in the events industry and there is a plan to roll it out into the leisure industry. It's really important for the city's reputation that we're not seeing as over-inflating our prices."

London has designated One Great George Street in the city center as the media center for non-accredited journalists. Mark Howell, Director of International Media Liaison for London 2012, says the London Media Center will offer high-quality facilities to those coming to the city without necessarily concentrating on the sporting action.

"It will be a consistent offering with previous Games. We've seen the non-accredited media center in Sydney in 2000, evolve through Nagano, Athens, then through with Vancouver, Beijing, some fantastic offerings. Likewise, we're looking at delivering the same quality facility for the city media center as LOCOG are looking to do for the main press center and the international broadcast center."