A file photo of famous Peking Opera Legend of the White Snake [Baidu]

Peking Opera is "very likely" to be included on the World Intangible Cultural Heritage list this year, the president of the Peking Opera Troupe said yesterday.

Wang Yuzhen, who is also a member of the ongoing third session of 11th Beijing municipal committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Committee, said its inclusion could be completed in the second half of the year.

Jiang Gongmin, head of the Beijing municipal bureau of culture, who is in charge of the application process to the United Nations Educational Scientific and Culture Organization (UNESCO), confirmed the news but refused to give further information.

Qian Rong, director of the intangible culture heritage office within the Beijing municipal bureau of culture, has been following up on the application process.

She said she has not yet received any news from UNESCO.

Last year, UNESCO included 22 intangible cultural heritage items and three in need of urgent safeguarding on the list of World Intangible Cultural Heritage.

China is the country with the most items on the list.

Peking Opera and traditional Chinese medicine were named in October as pieces of cultural heritage that had made it through to the next round of the application process.

In 2001, UNESCO named Kunqu Opera, the oldest and most influential form of Chinese opera that emerged 600 years ago, as a masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.

Last year, Yueju Opera and Cantonese opera were also included on the list.

Wang, who is also a Peking Opera master, said she would love to see Peking Opera acknowledged around the world as an influential form of theatrical opera. But she said inclusion on the list would not mean the art form would be consigned to the museum as an old-fashioned art form.

"No matter whether Peking Opera finally appears on the list or not, we will have to keep pushing the business in a commercial way," she said.

She said most Peking Opera troupes in China would not be able to survive without financial support from the government.