Endangered embroidery to weave global network

Whenever Wei Fengxian attends a big event in her home county, she and her family wear delicately embroidered clothes feature their ethnic identity: the Dong people.

The 51-year-old woman began to learn Dong embroidery from her mother when she was eight. The exquisite handicraft was a must for girls of her ethnic group, one of China's largest minorities.

Living in Tongle Township in Sanjiang County of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Wei designs and produces traditional clothes.

Wei's work is so distinctive that it was added to Guangxi's regional intangible cultural heritage list in 2009.

"Embroidery is a really important part of Dong culture," she said.

The ethnic group now has a population of nearly 3 million across the country.

In 2008, some 270 pieces of such embroidery were presented to delegations at the China-ASEAN Expo held in Nanning, the regional capital, to represent Guangxi's ethnic heritage.

Her excellent artistry fails to attract enough young successors inside the ethnic group, however, pushing the handicraft onto the brink of extinction.

"Most young people have gone to big cities to seek decent salaries and a better life, leaving the handicraft largely ignored," said Wei.

In an attempt to revitalize the Dong embroidery, Wei and her fellow villagers established a study center, to pass on the art of Dong embroidery by training young girls interested in the craft.

But the effort made little impact in her hometown, as the study center, just a simply equipped room in her small tile-roofed house, only attracted a few young people.

"We don't have enough money to run the center effectively because we charge not a cent from the students," she said, adding that the center came out of pure passion for the craft.

Chen Zixin, a township official, insists that the local government is trying hard to keep their heritage alive.

"We are trying to make the Dong embroidery a central feature of our thriving local tourism. We want tourists to buy embroidery items when they travel here," Chen said.

Local government now sponsors exhibitions and rewards winners of annual contests to protect the endangered embroidery.

But Wei feels the existing government support is far from enough. "I hope the government will allocate more funds for the development of our embroidery," she said.