As China's national strength and people's living standard have further improved, more and more Chinese people have begun to collect jade. There are several million jade collectors in China today, said Hou Yancheng, chairman of the China Jade Collection Association.

On October 9-13, the country's first jade exhibition will be held in Beijing. To many jade collectors, this is no doubt good news, the Beijing Evening News reported.

It will be a large and high-class jade exhibition. More than 300 jade items will be displayed and the oldest piece might be 6,000 years old.

About 10,000 years ago, China entered into the New Stone Age. Agricultural production and animal husbandry began to appear. At that time, ancient people began to produce tools or art pieces from stones, said Zhou Nanquan, an expert on jade appraisal.

As stone production developed, people tended to choose hard stones that had beautiful colors to make tools or decorative items. This was how the earliest jade pieces had formed, he said.

China has a history of 5,000 years. However, Chinese jade culture has existed for at least 7,000-8,000 years. Jade culture has become an integral part of traditional Chinese culture, Zhou noted.

A high-level jadeware forum will be held at the exhibition. During the forum, scholars will discuss how to protect cultural relics and promote jade culture. They will also discuss how to make the jade collection, which often exists among the people, recognized by more people at home and abroad.
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(Chinanews.cn September 30, 2007)