05 Dec 2013

The North East district Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) committee has been urged to constantly update their ICH inventory because as aliving heritage, it is dynamic and constantly re-created.

Addressing the committee members at the five day evaluation workshop in Francistown on Monday, December 2, the acting director of Arts and Culture,  Dean Molebatsi explained that through the workshop they hoped to empower the committee to safeguard ICH for future generations.

He noted often data from research and evaluation workshops got lost as people believed its collection was part of the implementation process.

Molebatsi said it was for that reason that they were encouraging ICH committees in the district to always have their inventories updated. He noted the inventory could be used to draw business opportunities that that could create employment creation and the diversification of the economy of the district and the country. Molebatsi also added that the evaluation process enabled them to get in depth information on prioritised and selected ICH elements for possible inscription, draft nomination and filing for updating and storage.

He advised that financial and technical assistance was available for cultural programmes and projects from UNESCO.The acting director therefore encouraged the district ICH committee to apply for funds to continue the implementation and domestication of the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of ICH. He nonetheless said he was aware that Domboshaba Cultural Trust hosted their cultural festival annually in an effort to promote the Ikalanga culture.

But he urged the community as well to be full participants and help safeguard culture for posterity. Moreover he explained that the research exercise in the district commenced on the 5th of August 2013 and that researchers had managed to record all domains of intangible cultural heritage. He said 149 elements in the district were recorded. He said since the elements were non-exhaustive the researchers hoped to record more in the next research to add to the data collected.

The objective of the workshop was to assess and reflect on the results of the research exercise and to identify a repository for the ICH inventory as well as to prioritise elements for nomination. ENDS