UNESCO has embarked on the establishment of a follow-up and evaluation mechanism for activities carried out under the Convention’s global capacity-building programme. The programme is part of global and national efforts to attain long-term development goals benefitting more than 65 countries to date. While it is considered by many the most important mechanism of the Convention, little is known about its long term effects at country level. How do the participants of training workshops use the knowledge acquired? How do countries build on the policy support provided? How do UNESCO and the donor community know that the programme is effective and on the right track?
These questions and other conceptual and practical issues of establishing the follow-up mechanism will be discussed at a workshop organized from 1 to 3 June 2015 at UNESCO Headquarters by the Convention’s Secretariat and with the support of the Intangible Cultural Heritage Fund. Thirty key programme constituents, namely national counterparts (including National Commissions for UNESCO), expert facilitators and UNESCO colleagues from all regions of the world will arrive in Paris to provide advice.
An experienced evaluation expert, Mr Gregor Meiering has worked with the Secretariat to develop a draft framework for the mechanism and is co-facilitating the debates. The results will be presented to the tenth session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage to take place in Namibia from 30 November to 4 December 2015 and inform the Committee’s larger debate on a results framework for the Convention.
1 June 2015