China invests heavily to protect Tibet's intangible cultural heritage

Xinhua, August 21, 2011

China has invested more than 60 million yuan (9.38 million U.S dollars) on the protection of Tibet's intangible cultural heritage (ICH) over the past six years, a senior cultural official said Sunday.

The Ministry of Culture has earmarked 32.58 million yuan for the protection and inheritance of Tibet's ICH, Yang Jinzhi, vice minister of culture, said at the ongoing 3rd China Tibetan Culture Forum.

Meanwhile, the government of Tibet also allocated nearly 30 million yuan for Tibet's ICH, Yang said.

More than 3,000 people were mobilized to conduct surveys over Tibet's ICH, during which nearly 500 ICH items were recorded and more than 1,000 ICH inheritors were listed.

A total of 76 ICH items including the traditional Tibetan medicine and paper, the Tibetan silk painting Thangka and the Tibetan dance music Nangma were registered as country-level ICHs, while 53 Tibetan artists were listed as country-level ICH inheritors.

China has also set up a research institute and allocated a special fund to compile and publish the Epic of King Gesar, the world's longest orally narrated epic poem that relates the heroic deeds of legendary lord of Gesar, Yang said.

The two-day China China Tibetan Culture Forum that opened Saturday in Tibet was attended by more than 400 Tibetan experts from 17 countries and regions.

The first forum was held in Beijing in 2006 and the second one was held in Katmandu, Nepal, in 2007.