Decision 41 COM 7B.71

Island of Saint-Louis (Senegal) (C 956bis)

The World Heritage Committee,

1. Having examined Document WHC/17/41.COM/7B.Add.2,
2. Recalling Decision 40 COM 7B.18, adopted at its 40th session (Istanbul/UNESCO, 2016),
3. Notes the recent measures taken by the State Party to strengthen and adapt the governance of the property and deal with the issues to conserve its Outstanding Universal Value (OUV), in particular:
   1. The creation of a single Regional Committee responsible for the authorization of the constructions and work concerning the property,
   2. The creation of a specialised police unit installed at Saint Louis for surveillance and ground soil conservation activities,
   3. The announcement of the establishment of an inventory of the most threatened public and private buildings and a plan for priority restoration to be conducted with support from a dedicated financial fund,
   4. The proposal to recruit an architect-urbanist for the project;
4. Commends the consistent mobilization of the local communities (Associations, District Councils, etc.) and the effective involvement of the private partners in the safeguarding actions for the property;
5. Notes nevertheless, that the property remains vulnerable because the earlier deterioration was not halted and urges the State Party to pursue its efforts to improve the management and governance of the property, and to put in place the following measures:
   1. Revitalize the management structure of the property and clarify the role of the many bodies involved in the current management of the property and their coordination,
   2. Confirm the preparation of a documented technical inventory (database) of the endangered buildings to envisage their maintenance and appropriate restoration, and to achieve this, to implement the following points:
      1. The Commission for the authorization of work must have the resources to monitor their implementation and intervene in the event of non-conformity,
      2. Planning with a timetable of priority work to be urgently conducted and in the medium-term to rehabilitate the most dilapidated or threatened historic buildings,
      3. The effective establishment of the public and private fund to guarantee the implementation of these works, and its operating methods,
      4. The confirmation of the recruitment of an architect town planner specialized in the technical and architectural direction of a plan for the restoration of historic buildings expressing an Outstanding Universal Value,
      5. The development of a permanent team to prescribe good practices and technical intervention for conservation, in support of the architect-urbanist to be made available to the project,
      6. The development and implementation of a monitoring system to record building conditions over time,
   3. Develop a communication strategy aimed at sharing the values of the property with the inhabitants, in particular through the establishment of the Heritage House,
   4. Establish monitoring of the geomorphological evolution of the mouth of the Senegal River to assess the potential or possible threats to the conservation of the physical integrity of the soil supporting the property;
6. Requests the State Party to submit to the World Heritage Centre, by 1 December 2018, an updated report on the state of conservation of the property and the implementation of the above, for examination by the World Heritage Committee at its 43rd session in 2019.