The World Heritage Volunteers initiative is 10 years old!

This year celebrates the 10 years of the World Heritage Volunteers initiative!

This project is organized in the framework of the UNESCO World Heritage Education Programme, led by the UNESCO World Heritage Centre (WHC).The goal of the WHV initiative is to raise awareness about heritage, help people understand its global impact, but also to concretely protect and conserve monuments and sites. To do so, heritage NGOs around the world are invited by the UNESCO to organise volunteer workcamps for young people on World Heritage Site that need to be safeguarded.

 

 

As a member of the CCIVS, REMPART is proud to observe how successful the initiative is: it started in 2008 with 12 actions camps and 153 volunteers. At the end of 2017, there were 341 action camps in World Heritage Sites all over the world, involving 110 organizations and gathering more than 5.000 volunteers.

REMPART led 7 World Heritage Volunteers actions: we cooperated with the Albanian National Trust in 2010 on the UNESCO World Heritage site of Historic Centres of Berat and Gjirokastra, in cooperation with the Institute of Monuments in Tirana and the Gjirokastra Municipality. In 2012 and 2013, we worked with our dear partners from the Ruan Yisan Heritage Foundation on the UNESCO World Heritage site of Ancient City of Ping Yao in China.

 

Description: Ancient City of Ping Yao (China)
Author: Thierry Joffroy
Copyright: © CRA-terre

 

We also carried out 3 projects on the UNESCO World Heritage site of Saint-Emilion through Association Adichats and with the support of the Municipality of Saint Émilion, the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry for Youth and Sports. In the scope of the project, REMPART also organised a training in Tusson in 2011, thanks to the Club Marpen.

We are happy we could give the chance to volunteers to help safeguarding incredible and meaningful heritage sites. The WHV initiative is a wonderful opportunity for volunteers to commit for heritage but also to develop themselves and to get involved in a concrete way for the community. It explains its growing success among young people all over the world. REMPART will happily participate again!

Find out more about the WHV initiative here.