Coordinate efforts to protect village culture

A RESEARCH REPORT JOINTLY published by the Changsha-based Central South University and Guangming Daily indicates the protection of old villages is confronted with five problems: the lack of legal protection, over-development, shrinking populations, stereotyped buildings and the contradiction between protecting the appearance of the village and the need to improve residents' livelihoods. Beijing Youth Daily comments:

The problems highlighted in the report are not new and were noted by the central authorities long before the report was published. However, there are limited funds available and these are used to try and protect the most valuable old villages, most of which have become tourist attractions.

In 2012, the government initiated a survey on nearly 20,000 valuable old villages. Two years later, 1,561 were put under State protection.