Majority of Chinese museums free

More than 1,800 museums in China charge no admission fee, accounting for 60 percent of the country's total, according to the State Administration of Cultural Heritage (SACH). The number of visitors to the museums has surged by 50 percent since April 2008, when they began implementing the free admission policy, said Shan Jixiang, director of the SACH, at a forum focusing on the cultural industry held Wednesday in Nanning, capital city of southern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Having replaced Japan as the world's second largest economy, China is seeking to beef up the nation's cultural soft power and further promote its culture. Culture is emerging as an important part of the country's comprehensive competitiveness in today's world, according to a communique issued after the sixth plenary session of the 17th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China that concluded Tuesday in Beijing. China will build a well-off society of a higher level by providing its people with not only ample material life, but also a healthy and rich cultural life, according to the communique. Great efforts are called for the improvement of infrastructure and services so that more common people can enjoy free or less costly cultural services, it said.