LHASA -- Southwest China's Xizang autonomous region has spent a total of 320 million yuan (about $45 million) in recent years on 56 projects for the protection of movable cultural heritage, according to the regional cultural heritage bureau on Friday.

Xu Shaoguo, deputy director of the bureau, highlighted the progress that has been made in the preventive conservation of movable relics.

Xizang has launched several key digital preservation projects, including projects digitizing ancient manuscripts such as the palm-leaf manuscripts of the Potala Palace. These projects facilitate the comprehensive viewing, archiving and management of movable cultural relics.

It has also prioritized the restoration of movable relics, forming partnerships between regional cultural authorities and national institutions.

Xizang's museum system has seen continuous expansion and now has a network of 43 museums, including state-owned institutions, private institutions, memorial halls, and relic exhibition halls in monasteries. These museums have reported a steady rise in visitor numbers, surpassing 3.66 million visitors in 2023 and topping 3.25 million in the first nine months of 2024.

Data shows that Xizang is home to 2,373 protected cultural heritage sites, over 1,000 of which house registered movable relics. In total, more than 510,000 individual or sets of movable cultural relics have been documented across the region.