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Regional technical meeting on underwater cultural heritage held in Uruguay |
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Representatives of 22 Member States joined in Montevideo to participate in the meeting aimed at promoting regional cooperation for the protection of underwater cultural heritage
29 November 2022/ UNESCO Office in Montevideo
The Regional Technical Meeting on the protection of underwater cultural heritage in Latin America and the Caribbean was held in Montevideo from 29 November to 1 December. It was jointly organised by the UNESCO offices in San José and Montevideo, with the support of the Secretariat of the 2001 Convention, the UNESCO Regional Office for Culture in Latin America and the Caribbean, the Ministry of Education and Culture of Uruguay and the National Commission for Cultural Heritage, and thanks to funding from the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID).
The meeting is part of UNESCO's work to support the implementation of the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage (2001), which celebrated its 20th anniversary last year, and the unique opportunity provided by the Decade of Ocean Sciences for Sustainable Development (2021-2030) to address a cross-cutting and multidisciplinary approach in fulfilment of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
The event was held at the Spanish Cooperation Training Centre in Uruguay and attended by technical representatives from Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Ecuador, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela.
The working agenda divided into 7 thematic sessions that addressed the main issues related to underwater heritage such as capacity building, the role of communities for the protection, management and enhancement, the relationship of this heritage with sustainable development and the fight against climate change, the importance of regulatory development, the cross-cutting nature of other UNESCO Conventions, or the awareness of the general public, among others.
In addition, the third day was completed with a field visit to Colonia del Sacramento organised by the Cultural Heritage Commission of Uruguay and in collaboration with the Coastal Heritage Research Centre of the University of the Republic, with the aim of presenting Uruguay's work in relation to underwater cultural heritage.
The working sessions included presentations and working groups with different dynamics to encourage collaborative work with the aim of updating the Regional Action Plan taking as a guide the previous action plans, recommendations and roadmaps resulting from the UNESCO regional meetings in Peru (2013), Panama (2019) or the Virtual Subregional Workshop for Central America in 2020. In this work, special attention was paid to the priorities and challenges for the protection of cultural heritage in emergency situations and to favouring a cross-cutting approach to culture for education, scientific knowledge and citizen participation.
UNESCO thus reinforces its commitment to the region for the development of capacities and policies that integrate the identification, study, management and safeguarding of submerged cultural heritage, as underlined in the Final Declaration adopted during the UNESCO World Conference on Public Policies and Sustainable Development - MONDIACULT 2022.
Underwater cultural heritage is an integral part of the cultural heritage of humanity, with historical, archaeological, and cultural values that transcend the underwater context, essential to generate knowledge and rescue traditional practices of sustainable use of natural resources. Given its status as submerged heritage, this heritage is seriously threatened and in danger of disappearing in many areas due to its invisibility -making it more vulnerable to looting and commercial exploitation, coastal development, the effects of climate change, aggressive practices for the exploitation of marine resources, the lack of adequate legal infrastructures, or the scarcity of specialised human resources.
Related content:
UNESCO 2001 Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage
Learn more on the UNESCO’s actions on underwater cultural heritage
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Related Link(s): Underwater Cultural Heritage |
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