China's high-definition television (HDTV) has seen rapid development in recent years thanks to an increasing domestic demand and a series of preferential policies offered by the government.

However, HDTV in China is still in its infant stage, although the outlook for this industry is very bright, according to a speech given by Zhang Haitao, Vice-Minister of China's State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television (SARFT), at the 17th Beijing International Radio, TV and Film Equipment Exhibition (BIRTV 2008) in Beijing on Tuesday.

"The time is ripe for us to develop HDTV in China. Besides, the perfect performance of China's broadcasting during the Beijing Olympics, which for the first time in history adopted high image and sound definition broadcasting systems as its standard, has greatly promoted the development of HDTV."

In his speech, Zhang Haitai also emphasized that it is an inexorable trend to develop HDTV since domestic consumers are seeking better television image quality nowadays. However, the direct turnaround from traditional standard-definition television (SDTV) to high-definition can not be achieved overnight.

"The policy to develop HDTV in China is to gradually introduce HDTV channel by channel, and gradually make the transition from SDTV to HDTV."

Insiders say that the total sales volume of HDTV sets has already surpassed that of SDTV. According to a salesman from an electrical appliances store exhibiting their items at the show, the sales volume of each brand HDTVs accounts for around 70 percent of the total sales volume of that brand name television sets. He told CRIENGLISH.com that a HDTV set is now only about 1,000 yuan, or a bit less than 150 dollars.

A local visitor told CRIENGLISH.com that he and many of his friends believe HDTV is worth buying.

"We plan to buy a high-definition television set and put it in our bedroom. We believe its image quality will be better. Of course the price costs roughly the same."

(CRIENGLISH.com November 5, 2008)