Ritsumeikan University：Research Center for Disaster Mitigation of Urban Cultural Heritage【UNESCO Chair Program】

UNESCO Chair Program “Cultural Heritage and Risk Management”

Information of the International Training Course 2009

UNESCO Chair on Cultural Heritage and Risk Management
International Training Course on Disaster Risk Management of Cultural Heritage 2009
4th Cycle: 31 August - 12 September 2009,
Kyoto (Japan) and Kathmandu (Nepal)

The fourth International Training Course on Disaster Risk Management of Cultural Heritage will be held in kyoto, Japan and Kathmandu, Nepal, from 31 August to 12 September 2009.

In response to the Kathmandu Recommendations, adopted in the International Symposium on “Protecting World Cultural Heritage Sites and their Historic Urban Environment from Earthquakes” held in February 2009, this year’s International Training Course will focus on disaster risk management plan of cultural heritage in earthquake-prone historic urban areas.

You can download the leaflet, timetable (draft) and application form regarding the ITC 2009 bellow:
- ITC 2009 Leaflet
- ITC 2009 Timetable (draft)
- ITC 2009 Guideline for application
- ITC 2009 Application form

For more details on our activities, please see the web site:
http://www.ritsumei-gcoe.jp/heritagerisknet.dmuch/index.html

If you have any questions about this training course, please contact us: dmuch@st.ritsumei.ac.jp

Information of the International Training Course

If you are interested in the International Training, please refer to the documents below.

For further information, please contact us.
dmuch@st.ritsumei.ac.jp

Background

The Asia-Pacific region has recently been touched by many disasters such as earthquakes, Tsunami or warfare. In developing countries where disaster prevention and mitigation measures are not fully developed yet, these disasters have caused serious damage, and the lack of emergency response and post-disaster recovery plans have inflicted great damages and losses to cultural heritage. Such loss of cultural heritage leads to the forfeiture of common memory and cultural identity among the local people. As much as the social infrastructure that is necessary to rebuild people’s lives, cultural heritage is a common asset that constitutes the spiritual backbone supporting the people in the course of recovery from disasters.

The UNESCO Chair Program, International Training Course on "Disaster Risk Management of Cultural Heritage" is a follow-up to the Recommendations adopted at the Thematic Meeting of "Cultural Heritage Risk Management - UNESCO/ ICCROM/ Agency for Cultural Affairs of Japan" held under the UN World Conference on Disaster Reduction (WCDR) in Kobe in January 2005. The Recommendations requested the academic community to integrate the related fields, and make use of systems like the UNESCO Chair Program, in order to create an international support network and organize a training course on Disaster Risk Management of Cultural Heritage. Ritsumeikan University (hereafter Rits’Univ.), having been designated by the UNESCO to carry out the Thematic Meeting, felt it necessary to quickly realize the requests of the Recommendation as a member of the academic community. In December 2005 it organized the International Seminar on World Heritage Protection, to examine which were the fields of international cooperation that were needed and were possible to realize, and applied in March 2006 for the world's first UNESCO Chair in the field of risk preparedness for cultural heritage. Rits’Univ. regarded this UNESCO Chair Program as an international contribution based on the research outcomes of the COE Program 'Disaster Mitigation of Urban Cultural Heritage'.

The UNESCO Chair is one of the most important inter-disciplinary activities which the UNESCO carries out to return the results of higher education research to developing countries. Rits’Univ. nominated Prof. Kanefusa MASUDA from the Research Center for Disaster Mitigation of Urban Cultural Heritage (DMUCH), as the UNESCO Chair Holder in charge, and the Chair Program was certified by the UNESCO in October 2006.

2004	July	Prof.Kenzo TOKI, Director of Rits-DMUCH, and Prof. Kanefusa MASUDA, made a presentation at the UNESCO World Heritage Centre in Paris and on other occasions about the importance of holding a Session on 'Disaster Risk Management of Cultural Heritage'at the UN-WCDR and succeeded in getting international consent.
2005	January	The UN WCDR was held in Kobe, with the Thematic Meeting on Cultural Heritage Risk Management - UNESCO/ ICCROM/ Agency for Cultural Affairs of Japan on its schedule: for the first time in the WCDR, cultural heritage became a theme of discussion. Rits’Univ. had been designated by the UNESCO to implement the project and to prepare this Meeting.
2005	December	The Seminar on World Heritage Protection was organized; it considered ways to conduct a training course on disaster risk management of cultural heritage. It also identified the importance of Risk Management on the premise of securing the diversity of values of cultural heritage.
2006	March	Application made for the first UNESCO Chair Program in the field of cultural heritage.
	July	Prof. Kanefusa MASUDA, makes a presentation at the Davos UNISDR Meeting on traditional knowledge systems inherited in Risk Management of the Cultural Heritage and on how to approach an international training course on this theme. Cooperation for this international training course was granted, and information about it was published on the website of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre.
	September	Prof. Kenzo TOKI, Director of Rits-DMUCH, received the honorable recognition of the Prime Minister's Award, as an important contributor to the cause of risk preparedness and as the founder of the discipline of risk preparedness of cultural heritage, from the then Prime Minister, Mr. Koizumi.
	October	The UNESCO Chair was certified, and its Program "International Training Course on Disaster Risk Management of Cultural Heritage" started under the sponsorship of the Rits-DMUCH.

Purpose of the International Training Course

The International Training Course is the major activity of the UNESCO Chair Program, "Cultural Heritage and Risk Management", and its purpose is to invite experts both from the field of "cultural heritage conservation" and of"disaster mitigation". After attending the lectures, the field trips and the workshop, participants from these two fields were asked to work together to identify the problems in their respective countries and to formulate a Disaster Prevention Plan for their own cultural heritage.

The Outcome of the First Year

In 2006, which was the first year of the five-year program, 8 participants were invited from 4 countries: India and Pakistan, where a great earthquake occurred in 2005 in Kashmir, the border land; Indonesia, which suffered tsunami disasters originated by the Sumatra Earthquake in 2004 and by the Midland Earthquake on the Javanese Island in 2006; and Korea, which had suffered a big forest fire. The Training Course was composed of lectures about the principles and the basic approach of disaster risk management for cultural heritage, field trips to disaster prevention facilities located at the World Heritage sites in Kyoto and the areas damaged by the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, and a group work on the making of a Disaster Prevention Plan for Cultural Heritage based on the sites listed or nominated as World Heritage in the participants' respective countries. Information about this International Training Course was disseminated to the world by the UNESCO World Heritage Centre, and was highly evaluated by the persons in charge at the UNESCO.

More information about the program in 2006: UNESCO Chair program in 2006; Lecture Contents in ITC 2006

Materials of the Previous International Training Course

-Lecture Contents in ITC 2006
-Workshop Digest in ITC 2005 (1-5)

Links

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Ritsumeikan University：History city disaster prevention research center

History city disaster prevention research center