LHE/20/8.GA/INF.1 - page 33

- to strengthen the Convention in terms of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) and capacity building in education, considering the new world challenges and the increasing number of States Parties to the Convention, which were warmly welcomed. In many small islands, living intangible cultural heritage had provided a foundation for their identity. For this reason, the delegation insisted on formal and non-formal education as a foundation to build strong resilience.
- 148. The Secretary thanked the delegations for their encouraging remarks on the work of the Secretariat and on some of the new directions opening up that had been discussed in the Committee. He particularly noted the encouragement for the work on intangible cultural heritage in education, and intangible cultural heritage in emergencies, which was indeed good to hear. Some delegations had mentioned the need to highlight good safeguarding practices and the Secretary informed the Assembly that the Secretariat had recently undertaken a survey to respond to a Committee decision taken a number of years ago to find a lighter way to share good safeguarding practices, noting that the Register of Good Safeguarding Practices needed the Committee 's approval. However, owing to its huge workload, the Secretariat had previously been unable to carry out this work, but it had now instigated a survey among hundreds of organizations to understand how they might share these good safeguarding practices, after which the Secretariat would soon report. It was noted that Germany had a question concerning the communications plan and the use of the logo. Indeed, there were established procedures for the logo and in discussions with communication experts it was thought that these might need to be reviewed. Nevertheless, during the biennium the Secretariat had granted the use of the logo to fifty events or partners, but its use was still under the instruction of the Committee and the General Assembly. With regard to the question of whether the Secretariat had worked with other United Nations agencies, the Secretary replied that the Secretariat had participated in work with the regional office of the World Health Organization (WHO) on culture and health in the Europe region. The Secretariat also had some exchanges with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on a programme on important agricultural landscapes. The Secretariat continued to share information and ongoing discussions with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and of course, UNESCO Field Offices were generally more in touch with other agencies working in the field, such as the United Nations Country Teams. In addition, the Secretariat worked with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Kivu in its survey work on emergencies in the Democratic Republic of Congo with internally displaced persons. It was noted that when UNESCO was asked to work with another agency, it was also important to ask the other agency to work alongside UNESCO as receiving instructions from both sides made the work easier to enact.
- 149. The Secretary then turned to the question from the Philippines on how to operationalize on natural disasters, adding that the Secretariat had been working on the issue of emergencies in the Committees and it hoped to come to the next General Assembly with more detailed proposals and modalities. An agenda item on the issue [of intangible cultural heritage in emergencies] had been included in the past two Committee sessions, and the Secretariat had conducted some case studies in countries dealing with refugees in the Middle East. It had also dealt with conflict situations, internally displaced refugees in the Congo, as well as desk studies on natural disasters, which were indeed very important. What had emerged was the role of intangible cultural heritage not only in the recovery phase but particularly in the preparedness phase, as mentioned by Greece, and there were many ways in which traditional disaster preparedness could be built upon given climate change and the intensity of disasters. The plan was therefore to work with the next Committee to present more case studies over the next two years so as to establish an improved methodology, though it was clear that there was a need to closely consult with the intangible cultural heritage community. One of the things that emerged was the lack of emergency preparedness in terms of inventorying, so the Secretariat also developed capacity-building materials on intangible cultural heritage and emergencies, particularly for those countries prone to natural disasters so that it could be better integrated into their inventorying systems, emergency preparedness, as well as response. Colombia's question concerned the work on culture and cities, and