Sub-regional Expert Meeting on Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) and Building Resilience to Climate Change and Its Impacts in Western and Central Asia with a special focus on the role of non-governmental actors (Isfahan, 18-19 October 2023)
On 18-19 October 2023, on the 20th anniversary of UNESCO’s 2003 Convention on Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage, the Persian Garden Institute for Living Heritage (an accredited NGO) jointly organized with the Tehran ICH Centre and ICHCAP (both category 2 Centres for UNESCO) a sub-regional Expert Meeting on Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) and Building Resilience to Climate Change and Its Impacts in Western and Central Asia with a special focus on the role of non-governmental actors. In this meeting, which represented an important collaboration between these different stakeholders of the 2003 Convention, experts from Afghanistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan and Türkiye shared their country’s experiences of the impacts of climate change on local communities and their intangible cultural heritage and ways in which safeguarding measures have contributed towards supporting these communities while also building resilience in the face of such challenges. A number of insightful cases studies were presented which resulted in an extremely rich discussion and the basis for rolling out a follow-up pilot project in some of the participating member countries of the Tehran ICH Centre. The meeting also issued the Isfahan Statement on Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) and Building resilience to Climate Change in which a number of findings of the meeting are set out with a series of recommendations for future action by UNESCO, governmental actors and other non-governmental stakeholders. The Isfahan statement can be found in this document.
