Countries in South-East Europe share experiences on culture and development

On 20 April 2016, in Belgrade, the Ministry of Culture and Media of Serbia hosted the regional meeting on “The implementation of Culture for Development Indicators in South East-Europe: results, lessons learnt, recommendations". The event was organized in cooperation with the UNESCO Regional Bureau for Science and Culture in Europe, Venice (Italy). Besides taking stock of the progress made in the implementation process in the concerned countries, the meeting served to present and assess challenges encountered, threats and opportunities for improvement as well as a monitoring framework based on the Implementation Toolkit provided by UNESCO.

During its pilot implementation phase at global level from 2011 to 2014, the CDIS involved over 24 national level workshops to discuss and validate results, bringing together a large number of stakeholders from ministries, national statistics institutes, academics, development agencies and civil society. The pilot phase included Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Following that experience, since 2015, the UNESCO Regional Bureau is supporting to the implementation of the CDIS in other countries in South-East Europe, starting with Montenegro, Croatia, Republic of Moldova, Serbia, and Albania.

In 2016, other countries of the region are expected to implement the CDIS. Thanks to these joint efforts, South-East Europe is the sub-region at global level in which the implementation of the CDIS methodology is most advanced, providing an unprecedented opportunity to compare data, results, and sectoral policy at a sub-regional and European level.

Under the coordination of the UNESCO Regional Bureau, the meeting in Belgrade allowed to share as well as confront experiences and practices with partial results in the 7 key CDIS policy dimensions: Economy; Education; Governance; Social participation; Gender equality; Communication; and, Heritage. Recommendations for future action at policy level will be provided on the basis of the outputs collected so far. The meeting will also set the stage for a reinforcement of the international cooperation on the protection and promotion of the diversity of cultural expressions, at sub-regional level and vis-à-vis the broader European framework.

Officials representing the ministries of culture and relevant authorities of the Member States of the Council of Ministers of Culture of South-East Europe - Enhancing Culture for Sustainable Development (CoMoCoSEE), participated in the meeting: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Montenegro, Republic of Moldova, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Turkey. The UN Resident Coordinator in Serbia, UNESCO staff, and other international experts also took part in the meeting.

The workshop was inaugurated by Mr Ivan Tasovac, Minister of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia; Ms Tanja Miscevic, Chief negotiator for Serbia’s accession negotiations with the EU, Chapter 26 on Education and Culture; and the UNESCO representatives.

The organization of the meeting was made possible thanks to the annual contribution of Italy to the UNESCO Regional Bureau for Science and Culture in Europe.

This news is also published at UNESCO website: http://www.unesco.org/new/en/venice/about-this-office/single-view/news/countries_in_south_east_europe_share_experiences_on_culture_and_development/#.Vzl1f4crhaQ

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The UNESCO Culture for Development Indicators (CDIS) aim to highlight how culture contributes to development at a national level, fostering economic growth and helping individuals and communities to expand their life choices and adapt to change. They contribute to the implementation of Article 13 (Integration of Culture in Sustainable Development) of the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions.

CDIS provide evidence-based justification for the inclusion of culture in development strategies and plans. Their implementation allows to gather new data for informed policies and monitoring systems for culture; to build capacities in data collection and analysis on culture and development; to promote awareness of culture’s role in sustainable development through participative inter-institutional dialogue; and, to foster a comparable understanding across the region and at an international level.