The Committee,

1. Having examined documents ITH/16/11.COM/6 and ITH/16/11.COM/9.a,
2. Recalling Articles 7, 29 and 30 of the Convention concerning reports by the States Parties and Chapter V of the Operational Directives, as well as its Decision 10.COM 6.a,
3. Expresses its sincere appreciation to the six States Parties that duly submitted their periodic reports for the 2016 reporting cycle and requests the Secretariat to inform the States Parties concerned by the 2018 cycle at least nine months prior to the deadline of 15 December 2017 about the required submission of their periodic reports in either working language of the Committee or, if possible, in both languages, as well as in other languages;
4. Regrets that it was able to examine only six reports in the current reporting cycle and encourages the 31 States that have not yet submitted their reports to duly submit them at the earliest convenience and possibly by the deadline of 15 December 2016 to be examined at its twelfth session in 2017;
5. Recalls the importance of the reporting exercise and reiterates that States Parties are strongly encouraged to fulfil their reporting requirements before submitting new nominations;
6. Welcomes the generous offer of the Republic of Korea to contribute to the Intangible Cultural Heritage Fund in order to help the Secretariat improve the periodic reporting mechanism of the Convention, and requests the Secretariat to undertake measures to strengthen the visibility and implementation of this mechanism and to report to its twelfth session;
7. Further encourages States Parties to actively involve the communities in the preparation of their periodic reports and to include relevant information provided by concerned non-governmental organizations, research institutes and centres of expertise;
8. Welcomes with satisfaction the Overview and summaries of the 2016 reports as presented in the annex of document ITH/16/11.COM/9.a, appreciates the cumulative focus on measures taken by States Parties concerning the integration of intangible cultural heritage and its safeguarding in cultural and other policies including on sustainable development, and invites the States Parties to widely disseminate the annex among all relevant stakeholders, including non-governmental organizations;
9. Takes note of the different experiences, challenges and lessons learned reported by States Parties in the integration of intangible cultural heritage and its safeguarding in cultural and other policies, and encourages all States Parties to take stock of these experiences as a source of inspiration for improving their own policy approach and methodology for intangible cultural heritage;
10. Invites States Parties to pay special attention to the issues related to gender and to include in their reports information on the role of gender within intangible cultural heritage practices;
11. Encourages States Parties to underline in their periodic reports the contribution of national policy measures regarding the safeguarding of the intangible cultural heritage to sustainable development, particularly in the context of the role of culture in the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals;
12. Also requests the Secretariat to prepare an analysis with a cumulative focus on measures taken by States Parties to build and strengthen capacities in their territory for the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage as well as an abstract for each report that will be presented in the 2017 cycle and to include them in the Overview and summaries of the 2017 reports;
13. Decides to submit to the General Assembly the ‘Overview and summaries of the 2016 reports of States Parties on the implementation of the Convention and on the current status of elements inscribed on the Representative List’ and requests the General Assembly to take the appropriate decision concerning the non-production or production delays of periodic reports.