On November 9 2020, the Africa Unit of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre and ICCROM experts met online to develop a project that will contribute to capacity-building in disaster risk management and protection systems for World Heritage sites in Africa.
The project will be implemented in two phases: a series of online webinars, followed by a visit to an African World Heritage site. Lasting one year, it will target in its first phase six (6) pilot sites and contribute to the development of a disaster risk management plan adapted to the constraints of each site.
In addition, the inclusion of specific themes such as climate change and sustainable development objectives, as well as necessary coherence between the disaster risk management plan, management plan, and local land use and development plan were considered essential to ensure the achievement of expected results. The final objective of this initiative is to enable site managers to respond effectively to current and future disasters, provide pilot sites with an operational disaster risk management plan, and potentially produce a publication on disaster risk management and protection systems in Africa.