COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OF THE EVALUATION of the Commission Recommendation of 27 October 2011 on the digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation
Date: 2021-01-29
Institutions: Directorate-General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology, European Commission
Subjects: copyright, cultural cooperation, cultural heritage, cultural transmission, digital archiving, digital technology, digitisation, heritage protection, virtual library

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   EUROPEAN COMMISSION  Brussels, 29.1.2021  SWD(2021) 16 final  COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT  EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OF THE EVALUATION  of the Commission Recommendation of 27 October 2011 on the digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation {SWD(2021) 15 final}  
 
 
Background to the evaluation 

The  Commission  Recommendation  on  the  digitisation  and  online  accessibility  of  cultural 
material  and  digital  preservation  (2011/711/EU)  is  the  Commission’s  main  policy  tool  for 
digital  cultural  heritage.  Its  aim  is  to  optimise  the  use  of  information  and  communication 
technologies to unlock the full economic and cultural potential of Europe’s cultural heritage.  

Some  of  the  challenges  facing  the  cultural  heritage  sector  when  the  Recommendation  was 
adopted are still present today, but additional challenges have arisen since. In a context driven 
by  an  urgent  need  to  protect  and  preserve  European  cultural  heritage  at  risk,  by  major 
technological advances and by an evolving cultural heritage sector, the Commission launched 
an evaluation of the Recommendation. The purpose of this evaluation was to assess whether 
the Recommendation had delivered as expected and whether it still meets the current needs, 
expectations  and  challenges  of  the  cultural  heritage  sector,  of  its  users  and  of  the  public  in 
general. In particular, the Commission has assessed the Recommendation’s implementation in 
terms of its relevance, coherence, effectiveness, efficiency and EU added value. 

As part of the evaluation, the Commission consulted a wide range of stakeholders, including 
public  authorities  of  the  Member  States,  cultural  heritage  institutions,  the  Europeana 
ecosystem, research organisations and academia.  

State of play of implementation 

The Recommendation’s state of implementation varies across the Member States.  

Although  a  majority  of  Member  States  have  centralised  national  digitisation  strategies  for 
cultural  heritage  at  ministry  level,  there  is  no  ‘one-size-fits-all’  approach.  There  are  various 
ways in which Member States pool resources and competences together to achieve economies 
of scale for digitisation. This can be done by establishing digitisation and competence centres, 
consolidating  the  digitisation  process,  organising  training  and  sharing  best  practices,  or  by 
sharing services or facilities such as repositories. Most Member States promote preserving the 
public domain status of cultural heritage after digitisation through various initiatives, despite 
uncertainty and limited knowledge of the topic in  the sector. With regard to  Europeana, the 
quantitative  targets  have  been  achieved  (and  largely  exceeded).  On  digital  preservation, 
overall,  a  majority  of  Member  States  report  a  variety  of  combinations  of  action  plans, 
strategies and initiatives for the long-term preservation of digital cultural heritage material. 

Main findings of the evaluation 

a)  Effectiveness 

The  Recommendation  has  been  largely  effective,  but  it  needs  to  be  revised  to  make  it  even 
more effective. This is supported by the feedback from the consultation activities.  

More particularly, the Recommendation led to  a general improvement in digitisation, online 
access  and  digital  preservation,  resulting  for  instance  in  the  adoption  of  national  strategies 
and/or funding programmes for digitisation and domain-specific initiatives; a greater number 

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of public-private partnerships; more visibility and exchanges among the cultural and heritage 
institutions . 

However, there are several  issues (e.g. lack of adoption of technical  common standards and 
approaches,  insufficient  digital  literacy  and  skills,  insufficient  funding)  that  need  to  be 
addressed to make it more effective. 

b)  Efficiency 

to 

Respondents 
the 
the  online  public  consultation  gave  positive 
Recommendation’s efficiency, with most of them considering that the benefits are significant 
and justify the costs.  

feedback  on 

The  Recommendation  provided  an  opportunity  for  more  discussions,  exchanges  and 
collaborations  for  the  cultural  heritage  sector,  resulting  in  more  visibility  and  better 
prioritisation and thus triggering more funding. 

Society as a whole has benefitted: cultural heritage institutions have benefitted because they 
have  been  able  to  attract  and  leverage  funding,  collaborative  networks  and  wider  resources 
and  expand  their  audience;  governments  have  benefitted  from  growth  in  cooperation  and 
information  sharing;  creative  sectors,  teachers,  students  and  the  public  in  general  have 
benefitted from a wider access to digitised cultural heritage resources. 

c)  Relevance 

The  consultation  activities  revealed  a  general  acknowledgement  of  the  Recommendation’s 
relevance in meeting the needs identified at the time of its adoption.  

Socio-economic  changes,  significant  technological  advancements  and  legislative  changes 
create  a  different  context  for  cultural  heritage  institutions,  which  must  now  be  taken  into 
account in policy responses. Therefore, the Recommendation needs to better reflect the huge 
potential of advanced digital technologies (e.g. 3D digitisation) or emerging technologies (e.g. 
virtual reality or augmented reality). Moreover, it is important to harness the power of data for 
the  benefit  of  the  cultural  heritage  sector  (e.g.  through  common  data  spaces).  The  need  for 
advanced  digital  literacy  and  skills  have  become  key  to  cultural  heritage  institutions,  in  a 
context where the COVID-19 pandemic has made more compelling the importance of finding 
new  ways  of  working  and  connecting  to  audiences.  Intangible  and  born-digital  cultural 
heritage will also need to be taken into account in any future revision of the Recommendation. 

d)  Coherence 

Overall, the Recommendation is consistent with several other policy interventions in different 
fields,  such  as  culture/cultural  heritage  or  copyright.  In  particular,  the  Recommendation  is 
consistent  with  the  New  European  Agenda  for  Culture,  the  Council  Work  Plan  for  Culture 
covering the period 2019-2022, the European Framework for Action on Cultural Heritage, the 
Digital Agenda for Europe and its successor the Digital Single Market strategy, the Directive 
on copyright and related rights in the Digital Single Market, and the Directive on open data 

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and the reuse of public sector information. However, the Recommendation would need to be 
aligned  with  the  priorities  of  the  new  digital  strategy  ‘Shaping  Europe’s  Digital  Future’  to 
create a Europe fit for the digital age and with ‘A European strategy for data’. 

e)  EU added value 

The Recommendation’s added value consisted in increasing digitisation and online access to 
cultural heritage resources, as acknowledged in the consultation activities. 

It significantly helped to raise awareness within and beyond the sector and promote internal 
and cross-border forms of collaboration as well as exchanges of experience, knowledge and 
useful  tools  between  the  Member  States.  The  Recommendation  provided  a  forum  for 
discussion  and  cooperation, 
increased  visibility  and  additional  funding 
opportunities for cultural heritage institutions. 

leading 

to 

Overall conclusions 

The evaluation process has pointed to a considerable number of aspects for the future course 
of action. This  is because the cultural  heritage landscape has  changed significantly over the 
past years, with new needs, but above all new opportunities arising.  

The COVID-19 crisis has underlined once more the need and importance of improving online 
access to the use/reuse of digitised cultural material for the cultural heritage institutions.  

A  persistent  challenge  for  the  cultural  heritage  sector  before  the  crisis,  funding  has  become 
even  more  stringent  in  the  current  context  for  many  cultural  heritage  institutions  and  even 
more vital to their survival. 

The  cultural  heritage  institutions  need  to  seize  the  opportunities  offered  by  advanced  and 
emerging  digital  technologies  through  a  more  widespread  adoption  of  3D,  augmented 
reality/virtual  reality,  artificial  intelligence,  etc.  This  would  also  improve  significantly  the 
quality of the digitised cultural heritage resources. With higher quality data, high-value data 
sets  could  be  created  and  shared  in  the  cultural  heritage  sector,  thus  helping  to  develop  a 
functioning data space.  

Broadening  the  scope  of  the  Recommendation  to  cover  key  cultural  heritage  that  has  been 
marginally  addressed  or  not  addressed  at  all  (e.g.  immovable,  born-digital  and  intangible) 
would create a more complete framework of action for the cultural heritage institutions. 

Advanced digital literacy and skills have become paramount for cultural heritage institutions 
to  be  able  to  engage  in  advanced  digitisation  and  make  their  collections  available  online  in 
high quality.  

Europeana must play a more prominent role in enabling cultural heritage institutions to seize 
the opportunities provided by digital transformation in the cultural heritage sector. 

European efforts to further digitise and broaden online access of cultural heritage have been 
recognised at international level. Further partnerships in the field would help in finding shared 

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responses  to  common  challenges  and  exchanging  best  practices  as  well  as  showcasing  and 
promoting European culture, European values and European success stories.  

The  extent  to  which  Member  States  alone  will  address  such  key  issues  is  not  certain, 
particularly in light of the wide-ranging impacts of the COVID-19 crisis and thus of declining 
budgets.  However,  the  evaluation  analysis  points  to  a  situation  where  an  EU  intervention 
supporting the efforts of the Member States has had a strong impact. 

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