Lamine Diack, the president of the International Association of Athletics Federations, has urged organisers of the global governing body’s 2015 World Championships in Beijing, China to ramp up efforts to sell tickets for the event.

Diack said that “advertising and promotional activities” for the Championships were “too low key.” He added that China had promised 100-per-cent capacity at the evening sessions during the event, which will take place from August 22-30 at the Bird’s Nest stadium, which was the centrepiece for the 2008 summer Olympic Games.

“I myself visited Beijing for the 'One Year to Go' promotional ceremony in August 2014 and I was in Beijing again in March and again in April 2015 to support the promotional effort,” Diack, who will stand down as president next month, said.

“On both occasions I reiterated the need to invest properly in the promotional efforts to secure what had been promised to us by the Chinese authorities for this event – 100-per-cent capacity for the evening sessions and 30 percent for morning sessions,” he added. “But at the moment, we see that some evening sessions are still around 50 per cent of capacity, so we need to work very hard in the remaining weeks. We have no time to lose now.”