The preservation of Chinese cultural relics is developing positively, however, sustainable development hinges largely on human resource development. China will therefore begin training and granting accreditation to cultural relics preservation personnel in 2003.

Shan Jixiang, director of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, made the announcement in Beijing on Saturday during a national meeting for personnel.

Currently, he said, some local governments use cultural relics administrations as repositories for incompetent employees, which works to the detriment of cultural relic preservation. China currently has 70,000 persons working in the field, of whom only 12 percent had attended higher education institutions.

In December 2000, at the Temple of Confucius (551 BC - 479 BC) in Qufu city of east China's Shandong Province, local personnel splashed water and used abrasive materials to clean the ancient architecture, which led to the damage of 22 cultural relic sites to varying extent.

Confucius, who lived during the late Spring and Autumn Period (770 BC - 476 BC) of ancient China, was said to have lectured 3,000 disciples while seated at the rostrum inside the Temple of Confucius, which was placed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1995.

Shan said that destructive actions such as this still go on in China.

China should grant accreditation for the distinct aspects of cultural relics preservation, including the leadership of archeological teams, restoration, sales, auctions and preservation. Since there are some problems with the reconstruction of historic Chinese, China should also establish a special license for relic protection projects which could be further categorized into planning, implementing and supervising.

The science of cultural relics is a multi-disciplinary field for which China has provided inadequate training, he noted. Excellent, specialized young professionals should be assigned to key posts and wide-scale training should commence immediately.

He went on to say that Chinese colleges and universities, as well as scientific research institutes, should prepare professionals in cultural relics protection. In addition, he added China will soon establish four research centers, namely, the theoretical research center, the technological protection center, the information center and the ancient architectural maintenance center.

According to Shan, teaching materials will be ready in the first half of 2003.

(Xinhua News Agency December 23, 2002)