Englishman Mark Selby plays at the 2015 CBSA De Er Le Cup China Billiard World Championship.[Photo provided to China Daily]

People of Yushan, Jiangxi province, have a passion for sports. Every morning, hundreds of people exercise by the riverside, run across the bridge over the river and climb up to the mountains, come sunshine or rain. But they never imagined that this county of about 620,000 people and located in a mountainous area would be able to hold a major billiards competition.

The 2015 CBSA De Er Le Cup China Billiard World Championship is the first such Chinese event to gain international prestige.

It was held in Yushan from Jan 24 to Feb 2, and attracted more than 304 players from 23 countries, of which there were 108 foreign snooker and American-style pool players.

PVK Mohan, president of the International Billiards and Snooker Federation, said at the opening ceremony in Yushan that he was glad to be at the first Chinese billiards world championship.

The county recently signed an agreement with Beijing Xingpai Group, a private enterprise that integrates sports, real estate and investment, to build a Chinese billiards center. The project, which involves an investment of 3 billion yuan ($479 million) and 42 hectares of land, includes a billiards industry zone, an international billiards museum, production bases for billiards and equipment and training centers.

"We also plan to set up a sporting goods market that targets the whole country, where you could buy shoes, balls and anything here," says Zheng Xiaochun, Party secretary of Yushan county.

Zheng says that Yushan has been providing materials for billiards tables for Beijing Xingpai Group since 1996. The county makes more than 30,000 pool tables annually and more than 150,000 tabletops, generating revenues of more than 400 million yuan. China now has more than 30,000 billiards clubs, with more than 80 million Chinese billiards fans. The Chinese billiards market accounts for more than 70 percent of the entire billiard market.