The ICCROM-IUCN World Heritage Leadership Annual Donor Group Meeting took place online on 3-4 April, with representatives from the Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment, the Norwegian Cultural Heritage Directorate, the Norwegian Environment Agency and IUCN.
The World Heritage Leadership (WHL) programme is implemented by ICCROM and IUCN with the support of the Ministry of Climate and Environment of Norway, which provides both financial and technical contributions to the programme.
WHL presented an updated report on 2024, looking at resources under production, capacity-building activities implemented, and impacts achieved. Discussion focused on progress on the preparation of the forthcoming foundational manual on ‘Managing World Heritage’ and key resources such as the preparation of the manual on ‘Managing Disaster Risk Management and Building Resilience for World Heritage’ and the ‘Climate Action Toolkit for World Heritage’.
Additionally, the meeting provided an update on capacity-building activities on World Heritage management, impact assessment and disaster risk management and resilience implemented in 2024. The collaboration in the organization of the World Heritage Site Managers’ Forum in Delhi, India as well as other key learning networks such as the Heritage Place Lab 2024-2025 has also proven to be essential to strengthening the global network of World Heritage practitioners and foster collaboration across sectors.
Kristin Heggelund, Deputy Director-General of the Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment, delivered remarks alongside ICCROM Director-General Aruna Francesca Maria Gujral and Tim Badman, Director of World Heritage and Culture at IUCN. ICCROM’s Director-General highlighted Norway’s role in the World Heritage Leadership programme, stating,
“The support of Norway to the WHL programme has been invaluable and instrumental, and we deeply appreciate this unwavering commitment.” “Together, we have planted a vital seed, let’s continue this journey together with a clear and scaled-up vision to harvest the fruits of our labour for the present and future generations”.
The meeting underlined the contribution WHL continues to make to enhance local, regional and global capacities for the implementation of the World Heritage Convention and the effective management of cultural, natural and mixed World Heritage sites.
The Government of Norway’s unwavering support has played a vital role in establishing and advancing the WHL programme and has contributed to establishing a mechanism to deliver capacity-building in a structured and sustainable manner under the framework of the World Heritage Convention. We deeply appreciate their strong partnership and look forward to continuing this collaboration.