Decision of the Intergovernmental Committee: 18.COM 7.a.3

The Committee,

  1. Having examined document LHE/23/18.COM/7.a,
  2. Recalling Chapter V of the Operational Directives and its Decision COM 10.a.2,
  3. Expresses its appreciation to Colombia for submitting its first report on the status of the element ‘Traditional Vallenato music of the Greater Magdalena region’, inscribed in 2015 on the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding;
  4. Takes note of the efforts undertaken by the State Party to safeguard the element, in particular by enhancing its transmission in education, promoting the element through local gatherings and festivals, advancing research on the element, and ensuring the participatory monitoring of its safeguarding;
  5. Further takes note of the efforts of community members, organizations and institutions to adapt to the situation presented by the COVID-19 pandemic by maintaining initiatives that could not be implemented during the pandemic as part of the updated safeguarding plan;
  6. Encourages the State Party to pursue its efforts to transmit all aspects of the element, enhance its transmission through education at various levels, raise public awareness and secure public access to research on the element, and facilitate experience sharing among diverse stakeholders;
  7. Further encourages the State Party to address the protection of the rights and interests of the bearers of the element, musicians and composers alike, to continue involving vulnerable members of the population in safeguarding the element, and to ensure the participatory monitoring of the implementation of the safeguarding measures;
  8. Invites the State Party to prioritize safeguarding measures in response to identified threats to the viability of the element, to pay particular attention to avoiding its decontextualization, and to support the transmission of its social and cultural functions, including through its practice at traditional gatherings;
  9. Further invites the State Party to finish updating the safeguarding measures, and to provide a fully updated safeguarding plan in its next report with a detailed timetable and budget, prepared with the participation of the community;
  10. Requests that the Secretariat inform the State Party at least nine months prior to the next deadline about the required submission of its second report on the status of this element, and also encourages the State Party to submit it on time.

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