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Several Chinese cities, caught up in China's urbanization trend, are carrying out reconstruction that is harming and even destroying their distinctive cultural features, discarding historical value in favor of short-term interests.

Vice-minister in the Chinese Ministry of Construction (MOC) Qiu Baoxing issued the warning here recently at the national meeting on culture heritage administration.

The World Bank predicts that, in 40 to 50 years, China will have an area of 1.5 billion square meters under construction annually, with 10 to 20 million farmers moving into the cities.

Qiu emphasized that, by then, the need to protect historic cities will be urgent.

He said China has classified 101 cities as historic cities since 1982, and these contain the cultural heritage of the country. Currently, cities are facing large-scale "old city reconstruction", infrastructure construction, real estate development and environmental transformation. However, Chinese awareness and legislation have not kept pace with the demand for rapid urbanization.

The ancient city in Anyang of central China's Henan Province covers only several square kilometers and exemplifies the architectural style of the Ming and Qing Dynasties (1368 A.D.-1911A.D.). To ease traffic problems, the local government demolished a group of valuable ancient houses to make way for two big roads.

Qiu pointed out that some protected areas of historic sites were used for other purposes, some are over-populated and some have fallen victim to commercial centers. Some sites build fake "ancient" architecture with no historic and cultural value, generating fraudulent imitations of Ming and Qing Dynasty buildings.

Qiu said that there is still a lack of public awareness, maintenance funds, fundamental research, and laws and regulations for the protection of historic cities. In addition, there are conflicts between protection and real estate development.

According to Qiu, between 1997 and 2002, China allocated 150 million yuan (18 million US dollars) for protection projects in nearly 80 historic cities in 23 provinces and regions. Some local governments also allocated large amounts to rescue historic cities.China will allocate 15 million yuan (1.8 million US dollars) annually during the Tenth Five-Year Plan (2001-2005) in this regard.

By the end of 2001, China had drawn up a protection plan for more than 90 historic cities. The Ministry of Culture (MOC) and the State Administration of Cultural Heritage are joining hands to enforce special laws for the protection.