Document ITH/13/8.COM/13.d Decision 8.COM 13.d
1060. The Chairperson then proceeded to agenda item 13.d.
1061. The delegation of Brazil recalled the previous night’s discussions on establishing the number of files, adding that it was in the context of a whole package of revisions to the Operational Directives that informal consultations had taken place on the evaluation of nominations. The Committee came to an agreement to merge the two bodies into a single body that would retain features from both the Subsidiary Body and the Consultative Body, composed of 12 members to be appointed by the Committee: six experts qualified in the field of intangible cultural heritage, representatives of States Parties (non-members of the Committee), thereby addressing the issue of a possible conflict of interest; the body would also comprise experts from six accredited NGOs, one from each Electoral Group. Each Electoral Group would propose the members of this Consultative Body; the procedure was copied from the Rules of Procedure of the General Assembly for candidatures to the Committee. Thus, three months prior to the Committee session, the Secretariat would request the States Parties of the Electoral Group with a vacant seat to select up to three candidates, either an NGO or a State expert seat. Once appointed, the members would act impartially and in the interests of all the Member States, in line with the principles of the Convention. In the future, the body would be called ‘Advisory Body’, as according to Article 8.3 of the Convention, the Committee could create consultative bodies. The proposal would also require a revision of an already adopted decision [Decision 8.COM 11]. The delegation explained that some States expressed some concern that once an expert representative of a State Party from a developing country, non-member of the Committee, was appointed to the advisory body, the costs of his/her participation would need to be covered. The Committee therefore proposed a slight adjustment in the Plan for the use of the resources of the Fund to provide financial support to a State Party if so requested. The delegation further explained that the proposal was a compromise solution, in which nobody was totally happy, but that meant therefore that it was a good decision.
1062. The Chairperson opened the floor for comment, noting that if nobody was too happy, then everybody could be happy.
1063. The delegation of Nicaragua agreed that Article 8.3 of the Convention did state that the Committee could set up consultative bodies on an ad hoc basis, but that it did not imply that the body should be called a consultative body; it could be called an advisory group. The delegation had no objection in principle, but wished to clarify the letter and the spirit of the Convention, which was that the Convention enabled the Committee to set up ad hoc consultative bodies it deems necessary, but that the Committee was not technically obliged to call it a consultative body.
1064. The delegation of Brazil believed that the concern voiced by Nicaragua could be met by calling the consultative body an advisory body, or ‘organe consultative’ in French, as the French translation of ‘advisory’ is ‘consultative’, and in Spanish ‘órgano asesor’.
1065. The delegation of Spain did not object to the proposal, but as a result of this change, wished to add that this should be on an experimental basis because – as had been said in the past – the current bodies worked very well. It was thus willing to accept this new system to achieve consensus, but only on an experimental basis. It agreed with Nicaragua that the use of word ‘consultative body’ suggested the abolition of the Subsidiary Body. It therefore proposed ‘organe d’evaluation’ in French, ‘evaluation body’ in English, and ‘órgano de evaluación’ in the Spanish version.
1066. The Chairperson thought it was a good proposal reflecting the sense of the room.
1067. The delegation of Belgium remarked that today marked the celebration of St Nicholas, adding that although the proposal was not as sweet as the candy distributed by St Nicolas, there were elements of a good consensus. It commended the Brazilian delegation for its efforts in this regard. It also did not see a problem with including a reference to the experimental nature of the proposal, as suggested by Spain.
1068. The delegation of Morocco also supported the remarks by Spain in that the current advisory bodies were beyond reproach, adding that the proposal was taking into consideration the context in which the Committee was moving towards a single body. It welcomed Brazil’s proposal, and agreed with Nicaragua both on the question of the name of the body and its ad hoc status, in accordance with Article 8.3 of the Convention.
1069. The delegation of Nicaragua endorsed the remarks by Spain seconded by Morocco, adding that the proposal would be in line with Article 8.3 in that it clearly stated that the Committee might establish a consultative body on a temporary basis.
1070. The delegation of Albania supported Nicaragua’s comments, as indeed Article 8.3 mentioned the temporary basis, adding that the name ‘advisory’ would be more appropriate, as Article 8 of the Convention and Rule 20 of the Rules of Procedure also mentioned the consultative bodies that the Committee could establish. It was thus more in line with the wording currently used.
1071. The delegation of Nigeria expressed its appreciation and gratitude to Brazil for the good networking and synergy, which put together the consensus. Regarding the name of the body, the delegation felt that this was a semantic issue of wording, and that the important thing was having reached consensus.
1072. The delegation of China supported the proposals by Spain.
1073. The Chairperson noted the agreed principle that reflected all the positions and, on a temporary basis, gave the Committee the possibility to go further in its work.
1074. The delegation of Japan supported the proposal to create one body, remarking that an ad hoc consultative body pertained to the character of the body and not necessarily the name itself, so it could accept either ‘advisory’ or ‘evaluation’. At the same time, and before adoption, it wished to know how the new body would work and how the evaluation would occur, i.e. would it function in the same way as the current advisory bodies or would there be some changes?
1075. The Chairperson was of the understanding that the body would work according to the mechanisms and guidance that were already in place, as it made no sense to change the system, i.e. the schedule, the evaluation period and the working methods would remain the same. Thus, the merging of the two bodies enlarged the possibility of the Secretariat to fulfil the same activities as before. With regard to the name, the Chairperson highly respected the view of all the delegates, but taking into consideration the differences in the language versions, suggested ‘evaluation’, as it had a similar meaning and pronunciation in all the languages.
1076. The delegation of Azerbaijan commended the efforts of the Brazilian delegation and many others in achieving a consensus on this very difficult issue. The delegation highlighted two important points. Firstly, the cost efficiency of the body would provide the Secretariat with some flexibility to fulfil its work duties within its human and financial constraints. Secondly, the body would avoid the conflict of interest, as the body would comprise non-members of the Committee. As for the name, the delegation felt that if there was a conflict in the translation of the term in French and English, it could go along with ‘evaluation body’.
1077. The delegation of Spain wished to make a proposal based on the experience of the Subsidiary Body whereby on a number of occasions the Subsidiary Body had to revert to a minority position in order to reach consensus on the criteria, which had a somewhat perverse effect on some decisions because the majority had to yield to the minority. Thus, it proposed that for majority decisions, the body would need eight members for and four members against for the criterion to be accepted; this would avoid having the minority decide.
1078. The delegation of Brazil asked whether it was legally possible that the new evaluation body followed the Rules of Procedure of the Committee in its deliberations, or whether it would have to approve its own Rules of Procedure.
1079. The Secretary confirmed that the Subsidiary Body, as an entity of the Committee, applied the same Rules of Procedure as the Committee by default. Moreover, the issue of the majority and the minority was exactly the same as the Committee. The Secretary noted that the Committee had taken many decisions today, not all were totally unanimous, but were made by consensus in which the majority prevailed, and the others eventually joined those decisions. In certain cases, when the advisory bodies failed to agree, they would present two options to the Committee, such that if the body did not hold a unanimous position, then it was better to offer alternatives to the Committee. Thus, it was advised that the evaluation body maintain the same methodology, to the extent possible, in carrying out its functions.
Although options were advised if the body failed to reach consensus, too many options would suggest that the system did not work. In response to Japan, the Secretary explained that from the moment of the adoption of the new body by the General Assembly and its inclusion in the Operational Directives, it would become a new entity and the two other bodies would cease to exist. Likewise, all the current members of the two advisory bodies would no longer be members and the Committee would be called upon to elect a new body and propose names with the new procedure. However, it did not prevent the Committee from presenting the same members who had served in either body so as to benefit from their acquired experience. Thus, the Committee were obliged to start the new system from scratch based on a rotation system that would free up new vacancies every year.
1080. As the Committee was creating a new body, the delegation of Japan spoke of the general discussion that took place in its Electoral Group, with many feeling that the Convention should be applied in a more inclusive way. Listing was seen as important, with the Urgent Safeguarding List at the very core of the Convention. It therefore hoped that the new body would act in a way that would facilitate the inscription of nominations, particularly the Urgent Safeguarding List, so that more inscriptions would be made possible. At the same time, proper and appropriate screening and checking of the nomination files was necessary in order to ensure the credibility of the Convention, while the rules of this new body would be all the more important in the future. Another general view in the group was that more opinions of the submitting States Parties should be reflected in the debates of the Committee. For example, currently the submitting country had little say when responding to questions under Rule 22.4, adding that rather than posing questions to the submitting States, it should allow the State to respond directly to the recommendation introduced by the body, since they best knew their own files. The delegation was not seeking to open the discussion at the present time, but felt that at some point the procedure had to be changed.
It added that many countries felt that the Convention belonged to the States Parties and not to the Secretariat or the advisory bodies, and there was an occasional sense of confrontation between the Committee members, including observers, and the advisory
bodies. The delegation hoped that general views of ASPAC would be reflected in the future operation of the new body. It called on States Parties to start giving serious thought about the future direction of the Convention because it was very young, and that in this growing stage changes were necessary to truly serve the purposes of the Convention.
1081. The delegation of Nigeria agreed with the remarks by Japan, adding that from personal experience, it was better to give the floor to the submitting State so that it could directly defend its nomination. It explained that once the advisory body had given its recommendation, the State should straightaway be given a right of response or appeal, as this would both save time and lessen the politics. It also did not believe that it was necessary to go into the details of the rules. For instance, countries that were now leaving the Subsidiary Body should not now be part of the countries that will provide experts as non-Committee members, since they had already exercised their opinions for four years.
1082. The delegation of Brazil found the issues put forward by Japan and Nigeria relevant, which was in line with the proposal made by Brazil at the beginning of the last session, to experiment with the suspension of Rule 22.4 that would allow for exactly what Japan was proposing. However, that was not taken on board at that session. Nevertheless, the issue did not directly affect the current proposal, and perhaps – if Japan and Nigeria agree – a paragraph could be added to the decision to include an agenda item on the revision of the Rules of Procedure at the next session of the Committee. This would allow the Committee to reflect on how it could change its rules to allow for a better dialogue with the States Parties, non-members of the Committee. One further point: we need to change ‘advisory’ or
‘consultative’ to ‘evaluation body’ everywhere in the Operational Directives.
1083. The delegation of Grenada acknowledged that the issue of giving the floor to the submitting State had previously been discussed in other sessions and by other Committees, but it was happy with the current procedure in which the submitting State was able to respond to specific questions. It explained that automatically opening the floor to the submitting State invited advocacy of the file in a way that was not helpful to the Committee in making its decision. The procedure allowed the nomination file to be evaluated by a consultative evaluation body, now the evaluation body, so there is no need to open the floor to every submitting State Party to advocate on behalf of its file.
1084. The delegation of Burkina Faso thanked Brazil for its meticulous work that led to a consensus, and Spain for its proposal. It wished to point out that both the Consultative Body and the Subsidiary Body were entities derived from the Committee, and as such there was no fundamental difference between the bodies and the Committee. Moreover, the work of the advisory bodies was submitted to the Committee for examination. The proposal was in line with the position by Burkina Faso and, given the burden of work of the members of the evaluation body, it suggested that it was beneficial to the States that so required to be able to provide assistance in the implementation of the evaluation work. It explained that the State Party, member of the Subsidiary Body, very often put into place a multidisciplinary working group to work on the evaluations, i.e. it was not necessarily the work of one sole expert, and suggested that this possibility be maintained. With regard to the Rules of Procedure of the Committee, the delegation felt that it was important to always refer to the nomination file, adding that the States Parties had to demonstrate, when responding to questions asked by the Committee, that the information contained in the file truly responded to the gaps observed. It felt that the current methodology gave the submitting State and opportunity to provide an adequate response. Thus, it was preferable to maintain the current working methodology and to continue the reflection at the next session of the Committee.
1085. The delegation of Czech Republic also wished to thank Brazil for its efforts, associating itself with the remarks by Burkina Faso on the point raised by Japan and Nigeria. It noted that the Committee takes its decisions based on the nomination files and it did not see how giving the submitting State the chance to speak would facilitate the task, as all of the important information should be contained within the nomination.
1086. The delegation of Indonesia added that States whose nomination files did not satisfy all of the criteria almost always had the chance to reply to questions. Thus, they were for all intents and purposes given the chance to speak, and Japan, reflecting ideas that had been brought forward within the Asia-Pacific group, only sought to be pragmatic in this case.
1087. The Chairperson returned to the draft decision and the proposal from Brazil achieved through consensus, suggesting to approve the decision without taking into consideration the future activity, as this would be returned to later. With no comments or objections, the Chairperson declared Decision 8.COM 13.d adopted.