Since the launch of British Council’s Cultural Protection Fund (CPF) in 2017, opportunities to bring together practitioners working on different cultural protection projects across the world have always proved to be incredibly rich, stimulating and rewarding. This year’s gathering in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, from Tuesday, July 11th to Thursday, July 13th, was not different, providing an opportunity to connect/network, share and shape and inform approaches for all involved.
The event was dubbed “What Works” and had participants reflecting on the following questions:
- What does the contribution of cultural heritage to sustainable development mean across different perspectives and experiences?
- Is there evidence for this and if so, what is it? Are there any gaps in the evidence or learning which need to be considered?
- How do we and how should we talk about cultural heritage protection in the context of sustainable development, and why?
- Is there anything we should be working towards and need to do to position cultural heritage protection in sustainable development, including the post-2030 agenda
The learning gathering also marked the launch of our ‘What Works’ programme, which aims to support better outcomes for the new CPF cycle 2022–25 projects.
“The ‘What Works’ approach is centred around improved access to high quality, usable evidence and learning in cultural heritage protection; increased motivation to use evidence; improved capability to use evidence well and increased opportunities to use evidence in decision-making,” noted Stephen Stenning, the British Council Global Director, Culture in Action.
“Through our ‘What Works’ approach we hope to enable further collaboration, contributing to more co-ordinated impact across the cultural heritage protection and development sectors,” he added.
Speaking during the gathering, Simon Musasizi, CCFU’s Heritage Trust Programme Manager, shared what worked well during the implementation of the “Melting snow, rivers in floods; mitigating the impact of a warming climate on Uganda’s heritage”. He said it was the good community engagement/building of relationships, drawing on the community’s cultures, practices, beliefs, values and norms, working with cultural institutions and leaders as gatekeepers of cultural sites and good communication skills that ensured the success of the project.