Places where almost nothing is being done to preserve the treasure are those such as the cave paintings of Ajanta in India. These are depictions which capture the Golden Age of India - the Gupta dynasty.

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has been criticised for neglect of great monuments all around that country. Many of the monuments are in poor condition because of those sins of omission (such as ignoring the effects of pollution, weather and soil erosion) but also, on occasion, those of commission (excessive and uncontrolled tourism, vandalism and the effects of carbon dioxide and micro organisms). At the moment, mutiple conditions make the presevation of the Ajanta paintings particularly urgent.

And it is not shortage of funds that keeps experts from pooling their resources to preserve this site. Designated as a UNESCO World Heritage site, Ajanta could easily be studied and preserved by scientists, art experts and archeo/anthro/pologists from all over the world. Japan alone has given India a large loan for the study of conditions at Ajanta and Ellora. Most of the funds were spent by the government on infrastructure, particularly roads leading to the sites. A mere fraction of the loan was allocated for preserving the sites.

The major problem in India -- and everywhere, in every country -- seems to be bureaucracy. In term of conservation and preservation of heritage sites, there is a near-total lack of co-ordination between the different agencies involved. To take the example of Ajanta alone: in addition to the ASI overseeing this project, there is the state tourism corporation, the forest department, the Japanese funding agency and the Tata consultants. No one has conducted an important analysis of the pigments, without which it would be hazardous to experiment with powerful chemicals for cleaning and preservation. The analysis hasn't been done because the chemistry consulting branch has its headquarters in one city, while the real need is to set up a laboratory in one closer to the actual site. What is urgently needed, everywhere, worldwide, is an overall plan, one where every department works in tandem and not at cross-purposes. Sites like Ajanta are too precious to fall victim to short-sighted chauvinism.

Or, let us take for another example, the discovery in Gua Tamrim, Borneo, of a series of paintings of a variety of hands and human figures with masks and elaborate head-dresses.

Borneo’s cave art is at least 10,000 years old, and some of it could be as old as 25,000 years. It has survived all this time but now is at risk from foreign art collectors who pay to obtain sections of the limestone walls that bear the paintings. Even more urgent is the threat posed by businesses in this poor but emerging nation who demand huge quantities of limestone to manufacture cement. Additional threats come from tree-loggers who want to exploit the abundant forests, also leaving the region vulnerable to damage from climate change, traffic and erosion.

Luc-Henri Fage, a speleologist, has spent the last 20 years in Borneo studying and recording the paintings. “I realise that a developing country needs cement,” he says, "However, they should be urged to get specialists to study which areas to take limestone from. In the jungle, there are no restrictions at all.". Fage is campaigning vigorously to protect Kalimantan’s cave art. He believes it should be added to UNESCO’s World Heritage List which already includes 690 cultural and natural sites around the world.

At the other extreme, is the closing and shutting off of world treasures to the outside world.

The caves at Lascaux were sealed in 1963, following an order from the French Ministry of Cultural Affairs. In order to compensate for the closure, a precise cement replica of the original caves, known as Lascaux II, was opened in 1983 and it is to this copy that the public is now shunted. This reproduction boasts that it feature the two most important parts of the original caves: the Great Hall of the Bulls and the Painted Gallery. Visitors can also see a replica of the Shaft of the Dead Man, the Chamber of Felines and the Chamber of Engravings.

Altamira, Spain, was closed to the public in 1977 and now has only limited access. A replica cave and museum were built nearby, reproducing the cave and its art. According to the official site:

...this replica allows a more comfortable view of the polychrome paintings of the main hall of the cave, as well as a selection of minor works. It also includes some sculptures of human faces that are not visitable in the real cave.

This is achieved by an exact reproduction of the cave and its paintings, based on scientific data and produced with the latest technology. Furthermore, the New Cave has various points of interest, showing how our ancestors lived more than 14,000 years ago.

An “exact reproduction,” however, is still a copy – not the original. There are a million copies of the Mona Lisa, but people still flock to the Louvre to see the original. The actual experience of moving through those original dark and narrow passages and coming upon those eerie and ghostly running animals is lost.

However, not all the news is bad. Some cave and rock painting sites have their preservation and protection resting in local hands.

Near Santa Barbara, California, are the Chumash rock and cave paintings. Experts have dated the pigment samples from one depiction of a solid black disk outlined in white. The resulting data suggests that this is a depiction of a solar eclipse that took place on November 24, 1677.

The paintings here remain sacred to Chumash people today and out of respect for their cultural heritage, the museums, state and federal agencies do not give out rock art site locations. One exception is Painted Cave State Historic Park.

In Baja California, Mexico, in the Sierra de Guadalupe are cave paintings that are huge, complex murals and are a major attraction of the region.

UNESCO has declared those cave paintings a World Heritage Site and the locals go to great measures to protect them. Legally, you are only allowed to visit the caves with a licensed guide, which not only protects the paintings from tourists who are careless -- or worse -- but provide a boost to the local economy.

Time Magazine Europe published a sort of follow up to the article that appeared in the US Time, entitled: The Lessons of Lascaux/What have the world's other wonders learned about preserving cave art?
In it, the author (James Graff) points out that caretakers and preservers of Europe’s many other cave paintings have actually learned some lessons from the troubles at Lascaux:

"Thanks to the work that's been done in Lascaux, we don't have to spend so much time figuring out how to monitor conditions here. We're doing the same kind of meter-by-meter surveillance of the cave that they developed there. We don't have the same kind of problems, but that's partly because Lascaux has shown the importance of limiting visitation and keeping a close eye on the cave's condition."

And he goes on to point out that:

In 1994, 30,000-year-old paintings were discovered in Chauvet cave, recalibrating the timescale of cave painting. Only researchers are allowed in, and in light of Chauvet's fragility — and Lascaux's experience — that is unlikely ever to change.

It seems sad to me that, at this moment in time, the best we can do to preserve the great works out ancestors handed to us is to leave them alone. I’m hoping there’ll better days in the future. Maybe our descendents will solve the problems of preservation without locking the treasures away.