Enhanced understanding

For more than 1,500 years, the Yungang Grottoes have stood as a Buddhist art treasure trove with 59,000 sculptures, and are a testament to East-West cultural exchanges in the 5th century.

Last year, the UNESCO World Heritage Site welcomed 4.5 million tourists. The number of visits was 3.03 million in 2023. Hang said a gratifying change is that the low season is no longer slack — the site is often crowded with young, returning tourists in pursuit of a better visiting experience and a more comprehensive knowledge of the heritage.

Hang noted that this is partly attributed to more convenient transportation, and that Shanxi will continue to improve its road network to better serve the development of cultural tourism.

Apart from improving infrastructure, experts have stressed the importance of research, interpretation and promotion of the historical and artistic value of the cultural heritage.

Hang said that studies for some cultural heritage items are far from sufficient, resulting in tourists, enthusiasts of ancient buildings and cultural relics, as well as social media influencers, sometimes posting inaccurate information and misconceptions online, which may mislead a wider audience.

He said that cultural heritage preservation units need to establish an effective interpretation system and convey these professional explanations to the general public.

Shanxi boasts more than 28,000 ancient buildings and is home to more than 80 percent of China's surviving timber-framed structures from the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) and earlier, according to the province's cultural heritage administration.

Lu said that many of these destinations are worth visiting more than once. As a professional with 20 years of experience in the cultural heritage preservation sector, he still makes fresh discoveries and finds new angles for interpretation and curation each time he visits places like the Foguang Temple on Mount Wutai.

He added that in the future, the interpretation and utilization of cultural heritage will have to be customized for people with different needs — such as those in the preservation sector, the academic community and the general public — and a mechanism that allows public wisdom to contribute to innovative content and ideas for cultural products is expected to be established.

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