OPINION> Commentary
Walk free into history
(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-07-31 07:29

It is a pre-Olympics gift that citizens - and visitors - will continue to love long after the Games is over. The news that 600 more museums will open to the public free of charge next year will be welcomed by one and all. Add the 600 that have already cancelled their admission fees this year and the number of museums with free admission will be about half of the total nationwide.

The authorities from the State Administration of Cultural Heritage also revealed that the Palace Museum, the Terra-Cotta Warriors and Horses Museum and some others that are not free yet may possibly be asked to reduce their ticket prices for the benefit of the general public.

As far as the nature of public museums is concerned, they should never charge visitors since they are built and maintained with taxpayers' money. But it was understandable that most did sell tickets when the government was not financially strong enough to cover the full cost of maintaining them.

With rapid economic development in the past three decades, revenues for both the central and local governments have considerably increased. It is quite natural for the government to shoulder the cost of normal operations of these public museums and let the general public enjoy their due share of public welfare.

There used to be a craze for some popular museums to increase the prices of their admission tickets a couple of years ago. Some even argued that real value of the cultural heritages displayed in their museums should be reflected in the prices of admission tickets.

It was certainly against the nature of public museums for some to make a profit from them.

The central authorities of cultural heritage have done the right thing by gradually canceling the admission fees of some museums, making public museums serve the interest of the general public rather than making money as businesses.

Yet, the reality is that it does require a lot of money to pay the staff working in these museums and even more money to protect the items of cultural heritage kept within them. It might be problematic for a government to be able to always provide enough money for their normal maintenance.

If they are poorly managed because of lack of money, it is the general public that will finally suffer from being unable to visit good museums.

Encouraging visitors donate as much as they like each time they visit a museum may be a good option.

In this way, museums can collect some money to make up for the deficiency from government investment. By donating any amount of money they like, the visitors can help promote the spirit of citizenship.

(China Daily 07/31/2008 page8)