China to establish exhibition halls for 29 ICH projects

China's 29 intangible cultural heritage (ICH) projects, which are listed on either the "Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage" and the "List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding", will become major demonstration projects in China's future ICH protection work. They will receive dedicated special exhibition halls and training institutes, and the 159 representative successors of the 29 projects will receive further support.

During the fourth session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of UNESCO held in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, from September 28 through October 2, 22 projects proposed by China were included on the Representative List, and three projects relating to the Qiang New Year festival, traditional Li textile techniques of spinning, dyeing, weaving and embroidering, and traditional design/practices for building Chinese wooden arch bridges were included on the Urgent Safeguarding List.

Including the four projects that were earlier inscribed – Kun Qu Opera, the Uyghur Muqam of Xinjiang, the Guqin and its Music and Urtiin Duu Traditional Folk Long Song that was jointly proposed by China and Mongolia, China currently has a total of 29 projects listed, becoming the country with most projects included on UNESCO lists, said Ma Wenhui, director general of the Department of Intangible Cultural Heritage under the Ministry of Culture at a press conference on October 13.

Ma said that China has taken special measures in recent years to safeguard all 29 projects. For example, China established a special fund for the protection of Kun Qu Opera and allocated 44.85 million yuan in special funding to the remaining 28 projects between 2006 and 2009. Since 2008, the representative successors of these projects have received 8,000 yuan in subsidies per person every year.

Ma added that in the future, China will strive to establish exhibition halls and training institutes for the 29 ICH projects; existing public cultural facilities such as museums and cultural centers should arrange exhibition halls and rooms for the projects. It is necessary to systematically record the existence and development situation of the projects, collect relevant general materials, build archives and databases, and conduct dynamic overall protection covering both the projects and their cultural ecological environment.

Successors are major carriers and inheritors of ICH. In the future, China should not only publish their books and biographies and encourage various culture communication institutions to produce audio and visual programs or products for them, but should also offer necessary venues for their public relations activities and subsidize their teaching activities and award learners by granting those fellowships or scholarships in order to cultivate more successors. To date, the Ministry of Culture has appointed three batches of 1,488 representative successors for national-level ICH projects.

Reporters learned that the Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Law has been listed in the legislative plan of the State Council. Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, Fujian, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Ningxia and Xinjiang have respectively issued local intangible cultural heritage protection regulations to provide an effective guarantee for safeguarding ICH in accordance with the law.

Since 2004, the central government has established a special fund for ICH protection, and cumulatively allocated over 600 million yuan of funds. Various levels of governments have also arranged special funding for ICH protection. In the future, China will broaden the funding channels and actively encourage non-government sectors to participate in ICH protection work.

By People's Daily Online