The government is to conduct a survey of "movable" cultural relics it owns, which may not have previously been recognized as being of value.

This follows a successful pilot program in Chaoyang district last year, said Kong Fanzhi, director of the Beijing cultural heritage administration.

"All State-owned units are  included, both at a national and local level," said Kong.

He said sometimes cultural relics were not registered partly because the unit did not know they were of cultural value.

"A prestigious painter may have given a painting to a hospital in which he was treated, but it may not be recognized as a cultural relic," said Kong.

In the Chaoyang pilot, over 100,000 cultural relics were registered at places such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Beijing Folk Arts Museum.

Liu Zheng, from the Chinese Society of Cultural Relics, said while there is not an authoritative definition yet, a movable cultural relic can be anything from paintings and vases to larger items like Buddha statues in temples. 

"Many cultural relics have been lost or destroyed due to a lack of supervision. Even I don't know where to check how many have been lost," Liu said.

China's Lost Cultural Relics Recovery Program estimates there are more than 1 million relics outside the country, scattered across museums in 47 countries. It believes 10 times as many could be in private collections, according to a report in the Guardian in 2009.