The town of Nanxun, in the city of Huzhou, and five other waterside towns in the provinces of Zhejiang and Jiangsu, are applying to the United Nations to be listed as a World Heritage Site. They are China's first ancient towns to apply for World Heritage status.

The other five towns are Kunshan's Zhouzhuang, Wujiang's Tongli and Wuxian's Luzhi in Jiangsu Province, and Tongxiang's Wuzhen and Jiashan's Xitang in Zhejiang Province.

"These six towns are well preserved despite being centuries old," said Yuan Yisan, director of the Research Centre of China's Historic Cities.

"Preparations for application are going smoothly," said Yuan, also a professor of Tongji University, as he attended a ceremony to mark the issuing of postage stamps carrying pictures of the six ancient towns, which was organized by the State Postal Bureau on Sunday.

China had more than 40 well-preserved ancient towns built in the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing dynasties (1644-1911), but only six remain intact today, he said.

"Many of them were damaged by war or changed during the modernization process," said Yuan.

The Ministry of Construction has listed the six towns as candidates on its tentative list to submit to the United Nations this year. Yuan said the applications are being made with the help of experts from the United Nations.

The professor said the six towns are working together in their applications.

They have drafted an application report, which is expected to be submitted to the United Nations soon, Yuan said.

China now has 27 sites applying to be included on the World Heritage List this year. Yuan said the nation is currently seeing an "application fever" as more and more Chinese cities and local governments are applying for their historic sites and scenic spots to be added to the World Heritage List.

"But the ones that meet the demands of the UN are rare," he said.

The six towns started preparing to apply three years ago, and officials have been sent abroad to learn from the experiences of other world-famous scenic spots, in a bid to better preserve their towns.

As the biggest of the six towns, Nanxun is beginning renovations.

Shen Faliang, the town's Party secretary, said Nanxun will spend more than 100 million yuan (US$12 million) on renovating the street that runs north-south along the river.


(China Daily 04/11/2001)