Online Training for the Periodic Reporting Exercise in Asia and the Pacific: Outstanding Universal Value & Attributes

The World Heritage Centre is organising a series of online training sessions to accompany States Parties in Asia and the Pacific as they carry out the Third Cycle of Periodic Reporting.

This session is dedicated to Outstanding Universal Value & Attributes (Section II, Chapter 3 of the questionnaire) and focus on the following:

• Review of the definition of OUV, its applicability and implications
• Definition of “attributes of OUV”, in general and in the context of the questionnaire.
• Lessons learnt from other regions. 

Representatives of the Advisory Bodies and Periodic Reporting experts are participating in the session and will answer questions after their presentations.

Periodic Reporting is one of the two main monitoring mechanisms under the World Heritage Convention and a statutory requirement for all States Parties. It consists of an online self-assessment tool subdivided into two sections: Section I, which concerns the implementation of the World Heritage Convention at the national level; and Section II, which concerns the implementation of the Convention at the level of each World Heritage property. The outcomes of this reporting exercise are then analysed and presented to the World Heritage Committee; they also inform the Action Plan(s) for World Heritage in the region for the next 6-8 years.

As the scheduled in-person meetings to prepare the Third Cycle of Periodic Reporting the region of Asia and the Pacific had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Heritage Centre moved the training entirely online, in the form of short, (bi-)weekly training sessions for National Focal Points in the region of Asia and the Pacific, running between September 2020 and April 2021.

These sessions are organised for National Focal Points for Periodic Reporting in Asia and the Pacific, who automatically receive invitations to the online meetings. They are recorded and made available to the National Focal Points so that they may be shared with Site Managers and other stakeholders involved in the reporting exercise.

The online training sessions and the close follow-up of the Periodic Reporting exercise at the Asia and the Pacific Unit of the World Heritage Centre are made possible thanks to the support of the UNESCO/Republic of Korea Funds-in-Trust made available by the Cultural Heritage Administration of the Republic of Korea.