Editing Lacquerware (section)

====Industry====
[[Bagan]] is the major centre for the lacquerware industry where the handicraft has been established for nearly two centuries, and still practiced in the traditional manner. Here a government school of lacquerware was founded in the 1920s. Since plastics, porcelain and metal have superseded lacquer in most everyday utensils, it is today manufactured in large workshops mainly for tourists who come to see the ancient temples of Bagan. At the village of Kyaukka near [[Monywa]] in the [[Chindwin River|Chindwin]] valley, however, sturdy lacquer utensils are still produced for everyday use mainly in plain black.<ref name="Blurton"/>

A decline in the number of visitors combined with the cost of resin, which has seen a 40-fold rise in 15 years, has led to the closure of over two-thirds of more than 200 lacquerware workshops in Bagan.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=14946|author=Kyi Wai|title=Burmese Lacquerware Loses Its Shine|publisher=[[The Irrawaddy]], January 19, 2009|access-date=2009-03-19|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100811123843/http://irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=14946|archive-date=August 11, 2010}}</ref>