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28 October 2022
The final follow-up workshop of the third African nomination training workshop for Anglophone countries by the African World Heritage Foundation took place between 29 July and 10 August in Entebbe, Uganda. The goal of the workshop was to review the requirements for the nomination of sites on the World Heritage List and to track the progress of the various potential nominations since the first workshop meeting in October 2012.
The participants coming from Uganda, Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe, Eritrea, Ghana, Lesotho, and South Africa were working on the nomination dossiers for the following sites:
After the first week of the course, the participants, resource person, mentors and coordination team went to the site of Bigo and Ntusi in Uganda to conduct a practical exercise and to make recommendations for the elaboration of the site’s dossier for a possible inscription in the World Heritage List.
During the second week participants worked on the conservation, protection and management of the properties along with other topics. On the last day of the workshop, all participants successfully presented a draft nomination dossier for their properties.
The African World Heritage Fund (AWHF) was launched in 2006 to provide finance and technical support for the effective conservation and protection of Africa’s natural and cultural heritage of outstanding universal value.
The AWHF, in collaboration with World Heritage institutions and African state parties to the 1972 UNESCO World Heritage Convention, initiated a nomination training course for the latter in 2009. The course, coordinated by the Centre for Heritage Development in Africa, focuses on the development of nomination files (dossiers and management plans) for consideration by the World Heritage Committee. This was in response to the fact that in spite of its very rich heritage, the Africa region has continued to have the least number of sites (9%) on the prestigious World Heritage List.
The main objective of the training course is to build competence and capacity among African heritage practitioners in the development of nomination files, as required by the World Heritage Committee when considering properties for inscription on the World Heritage List. A very positive outcome of the 2008/9 nomination training was that the Kenya Lake System in the Great Rift Valley was inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List in 2011.
The nomination course consists of three phases – an initial two-week workshop, a six-month follow up phase, and a final two-week workshop.
The first workshop was held in Uganda from 15-26 October 2012. The goal of the workshop was to assist countries with the details required when compiling an application for World Heritage Status. One of the requirements of an application is detailed mapping, and reference throughout the application to these.
Peace Parks Foundation has been assisting the African World Heritage Foundation, and nominees throughout Africa, for more than a year now with GIS support for their mapping and spatial planning needs. These need to be an integral part of the nomination dossier. The foundation’s GIS section was therefore requested to share its expertise in GIS, GPS and cartography with the attendees of both workshops.
The AWHF also organises tentative listing training. An increase in the number and diversity of African heritage properties inscribed on the World Heritage List will also contribute to UNESCO’s global strategy for a representative, balanced and credible World Heritage List.
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