Sports participation in Singapore stays high post-pandemic: national survey
Nearly three-quarters of 4,500 respondents do sports at least once a week; jogging, walking and calisthenics most popular
SINGAPORE — Singaporeans continued to be active in sports as they emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic last year, with nearly three-quarters of those surveyed in the annual National Sports Participation Survey (NSPS) taking part in sporting activities at least once a week.
The survey results, which were released by national agency Sport Singapore (SportSG) on Tuesday (27 June), showed that 74 per cent of the 4,500 respondents aged 13 and above did so - hitting an all-time high since the survey was being done annually from 2015.
The proportion of frequent sporting participation has also grown from 41 per cent in 2021 to 44 per cent in 2022.
During the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021, the participation rate was 69 and 72 per cent respectively - higher than the 66 per cent participation rate in 2019 - as residents turned to sporting activities while working from home or being unable to travel overseas.
SportSG chief executive officer Alan Goh told reporters on Tuesday that, while the pandemic has skewed the sporting habits, the latest survey results give hope that Singaporeans will continue to maintain their sporting lifestyles even as they return to pre-pandemic routines.
"We definitely don't want (sporting participation) to drop," he said. "As we have reopened after the pandemic, people are now going back to office more, even as we try to maintain the benefits of hybrid work.
"We will continue pushing the limits to see how we can maintain or even increase this participation. Comparatively, we aren't the best in the world - there are other countries where there is a culture of playing sports and being outdoors. We want to try to hit that level as the next step."
Non-facility dependent sports stay popular
The survey also found that "non-facility dependent" activities - such as jogging/running, walking/brisk walking and calisthenics - are the most popular sports throughout the various age-groups.
While jogging/running (40 per cent) and walking/brisk walking (29 per cent) continued to be the top two most-participated sports, calisthenics/circuit training/stretching (15 per cent) has overtaken cycling (11 per cent) as the third-most widely-participated sport.
For facility-dependent activities, badminton and swimming are popular among survey respondents of all age groups. High-intensity sports such as basketball and football feature more prominently among those aged 13 to 19, while milder sports such as qigong and tai chi emerge as among the top sporting choices of seniors aged 60 and above.
As for sports participation among children aged between three and 12, the survey saw a stable participation rate of about 87 per cent among 1,000 kids, with frequent participation going up for those who have entered pre and primary schools.
In the past few years, SportSG has introduced programmes such as the $20 million Bring Sport Back plan to boost participation through community runs and other initiatives.
In June 2022, the national sports agency as well as Health Promotion Board had launched a revised set of the Singapore Physical Activity Guidelines, which set out a recommended target of 150 to 300 minutes of moderate-intensive activity a week for adults to attain.
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