Traditional Chinese Medicine, Modern International CulturePresident Jiang Zeming made the above remarks recently at a session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. This is the guiding ideology for the 1st China Cultural Festival of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) which is to be held from May 26 to 28 in north China's Tianjin. According to news released from the press conference on the festival held on May 17 in Diaoyutai, the State Guesthouse, more than 1,600 people, including State leaders, elite in the field of TCM industry, members of foreign delegations, academicians, noted herbalist doctors, presidents of TCM colleges and experts in TCM, will attend the festival sponsored jointly by the Tianjin Municipal People's Government and the State Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine with the support and concern of relevant State departments. With "Inheritance, Development and Sharing" as its theme, the festival will aim to carry forward traditional Chinese culture, develop the national TCM industry, publicize the unique cultural and philosophic connotation of TCM, accelerate its modernization, and thereby promote the development of TCM industry in the new century. TCM has a history of thousands of years in China and has established complete and intensive theory and practice systems. It's of a typically traditional Chinese culture, as well as an inseparable part of the world cultural heritage. The new century will see it more important to develop TCM in the world. It is gratifying to note that as more and more Western countries are tending to accept TCM and its theory, some countries have even tried to guarantee the validity of TCM through the making of law. The World Health Organization has shown great concern for the development of TCM in past years. Many world-famous medicine companies like Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson have shown great interest in developing TCM jointly with Chinese companies. In the sponsor's opinion expressed at the conference, "TCM still has a long way to go before it can be accepted by the whole world, this is because, they said, it is hard to understand its theoretical, cultural difference and deficiency in the research of some groundwork...Such being the case, we are duty-bound to host such a festival to promote the popularization and development of TCM and enlarge its influence in the world," said a responsible person from the organizing committee. The 3-day festival will contain the following main activities: the opening celebration, the grand unveiling ceremony of 150-meter-long TCM Sculpture, which has already been included in the Guinness Book of World Records, tree-planting ceremony, seminar and forum on the modernization and development of TCM, literature evening, free diagnoses and senior noble herbal doctors, calligraphy and painting meeting and exhibition of TCM cultural relics. The 1st China Cultural Festival of TCM will be a platform for the medicine elite, a source of the essence of traditional culture, a window of rich and colorful gems of traditional Chinese medicine, and a link between Eastern and Western civilization. By PD Online staff member Deng Gang |
| People's Daily Online --- http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/ |
