State of Conservation (SOC)

Total amount provided to the property: Support from the French, Japanese, UNESCO project (USD 1,438,000) and Norwegian Funds-in-Trust provides support for UNESCO rehabilitation project (USD 201,390)

Requests Approved: 0 (from1983-2001)
Total Amount Ap proved: 51,083USD

ICOMOS mission 23 to 27 February 2004

a) Ruins damaged by sea erosion;

b) Collapsing monuments;

c) Lack of clear boundary of property and buffer zone;

d) Population pressure; no participation of community;

e) Unclear management systems leading to inactivity;

f) Old legal framework.

a) Updating of the statement of Outstanding Universal Value;

b) Effective implementation of the site management plan.

During its 29th session, the World Heritage Committee commended the State Party for the efforts undertaken to establish a Management and Conservation Plan and a Tourism Master Plan for the site, and invited the State Party to submit the final document related to these initiatives, and to implement these. The Committee noted with appreciation the continued support provided by the Governments of France and Japan to address problems facing this property. The Committee requested the State Party to submit to the World Heritage Centre, by 1 February 2006, a report on the state of conservation of the property including follow up action on the recommendations of the ICOMOS reactive monitoring mission of 2004, for examination by the Committee at its 30th session in 2006, and decided to retain the property on the List of World Heritage in Danger.

 In 2005, promotional materials have been produced including full colour brochures entitled ‘Kilwa Kisiwani, An Overview of Its Cultural Heritage’; ‘Songo Mnara, An Overview of Its Cultural Heritage’; ‘Kilwa Kivinje, An Overview of Its Cultural Heritage’; ‘Kilwa Kisiwani, Ancient port City of the East African Coast’. An 89 page well illustrated publication ‘Kilwa Kisiwani, Ancient Port City of the East African Coast’ by Karen Moon, for the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, also produced in 2005.

With financial assistance from the World Heritage Fund, an enamelled sand stone sign was prepared for the Kilwa Kisiwani and Songo Mnara property written both in English and Swahili.

The World Heritage Centre notes that the State Party is putting significant effort into the conservation, proper management and sustainable development of the site. This involves the local community as well as the international donor community.

The Government of Norway is financing a project amounting to USD 201,390 entitled “Emergency Conservation of Kilwa Kisiwani and Songo Mnara Endangered World Heritage Sites”. This is implemented by the UNESCO Office in Dar es Salaam. The conservation project, which started in September 2005, is divided into four phases and will essentially entail emergency conservation work at the sites of Kilwa Kisiwani and Songo Mnara, as well as help train and build capacity of national conservation practitioners.

The World Heritage Centre and ICOMOS have received from the Tanzanian Department of Antiquities in December 2005 and March 2006 the following documents. One, a Site Management Plan (dated January 2006). Two, the Kilwa Tourism Master Plan (March 2005) together with other promotional materials and finally, the draft of “Revised nomination file for the World Heritage Sites of the Ruins of Kilwa Kisiwani and Songo Mnara, including the historical town of Kilwa Kivinje”. A further report on the state of conservation of the World Heritage Property was received on 1 March 2006.

The site management plan provides an excellent overview of property history, state of conservation of component sites, management issues and proposals to reconsider boundaries and inclusion of nearby related sites. The management plan articulates clear strategic objectives and is built around a statement of significance for the property. It is worth highlighting the extensive community and stakeholder consultation approach used in developing the plan. This plan parallels and complements the Tourism Plan first submitted as a draft in March 2005. The Tourism Master Plan is comprehensive and its approach and conclusions are well integrated with the approach to management defined in the property management plan

The State Party report of State of Conservation begins by presenting the statement of significance (as defined within the property management plans) and comments concerning integrity/ authenticity. The report describes conditions, issues and problems in many areas of the site. The report also describes various planning and management tools in place to protect and conserve the property, various social and economic pressures affecting the property and monitoring measures in place.

ICOMOS, in its review of these various management reports, tools and initiatives, finds the property management plan well conceived and executed. However, ICOMOS is disappointed that the State Party’s state of conservation report (January 2006) does not address how the management plan is to be implemented and to integrate the many other parallel planning and management procedures and tools already in place.

ICOMOS also notes that the defined aim of the management plan is to “guarantee the proper application of conservation and management approaches that would ensure that the World Heritage Site of Kilwa Kisiwani and Songo Mnara is rationalised to include the historic town of Kilwa Kivinje”. However, the State Party’s State of Conservation report does not comment on the intention to extend the nomination. Moreover, the State Party SOC report does reproduce the statement of significance from the management plan which recognizes the extension (to include Kilwa Kivinje) as a part of the property to be managed. ICOMOS further notes that the Committee in its 28th and 29th session did not comment directly on the proposed extension, except to request the State Party to respond to the recommendations of the 2004 ICOMOS mission, which focused on the need - among others - to extend the original nomination to include Kilwa Kivinje.

ICOMOS would also like to draw the Committee’s attention to the work carried out on preparing a statement of significance in the management plan, and the long section in the State Party’s SOC report on integrity/ authenticity. While these efforts place concern for significance at the centre of management decision-making and are very much welcome, ICOMOS notes that the statement of significance prepared ranges beyond the single criterion (number iii) under which the property was inscribed. ICOMOS also notes that the treatment of significance, authenticity and integrity derive from the previous version of the Operational Guidelines, and are not prepared in accord with the requirement of the Operational Guidelines in effect since February 2005.

Accordingly, ICOMOS supports the wisdom of developing a management mechanism which addresses the integrated totality of the territory (including Kilwa Kivinje) but stresses the importance of the State party signalling its intention to extend the inscription to do so as a part of the process, so that the Committee can be made aware of this approach.