ICHCAP

On 25 and 26 September 2022, ICHCAP and the UNESCO New Delhi Office held the 2022 ICH NGO Conference in Udaipur, India. More than sixty stakeholders from ICH NGOs of seven South Asian countries attended the event, which was held online and offline in cooperation with the Mewar Charitable Foundation, which is leading the safeguarding of the cultural heritage of Udaipur.

Under the theme of “Intangible Cultural Heritage, a Driving Force for Sustainable and Inclusive Development,” participants discussed ways for ICH to contribute to achieving SDGs and cooperation among NGOs and shared the meaning and value of inventory as one of the measures of safeguarding ICH in South Asia.

The results of the discussion were presented in a declaration, and the conference concluded with a promise to strengthen the network in the future.
The 2020 edition of the biennial ICH NGO conference was held online under the theme of “Intangible Cultural Heritage and Resilience in Crisis” to discuss the changes brought by the COVID-19 pandemic; in the same vein, this year there was focus on discussing specific action plans in terms of empowering communities and importance of resilience.

Participating NGOs introduced how their activities contribute to achieving SDG1 (No poverty), SDG5 (Gender equality), and SDG8 (Decent work and economic growth), and emphasized the importance of networking for information-sharing. In addition, in order to understand the regional context in greater depth and raise awareness of international conventions, an information session was also held on the community-based inventory from the overall results framework for the 2023 Convention indicators.

As a result of the first cooperative project between ICHCAP and the UNESCO New Delhi Office, the two organizations agreed to collaborate on various projects together in the future, and it is expected that more active measures will be designed when the COVID-19 situation eases further.