Kick-off meeting for the Memory of the World Malaysian Funds-in-Trust Project held in Kuala Lumpur
Andrew Henderson, UNESCO, presents a copy of Memory of the World Documentary Heritage in Asia and the Pacific to Yasmeen Yasim, Ministry of Tourism and Culture, Government of Malaysia. © UNESCO
UNESCO and the Government of Malaysia have successfully held a stakeholder meeting for the project entitled ‘Safeguarding the Documentary Heritage of LDCs and SIDS in Southeast Asia through the UNESCO Memory of the World (MoW) Programme.
The meeting took place on 20 September 2016 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and brought together representatives from the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, the National Archives, the National Library, the Malaysian Institute of Language and Literature, and the Malaysian National Commission for UNESCO to discuss cooperation in the implementation of the project.
The aim of the project is to support the safeguarding of the significant documentary heritage of Southeast Asia, with a particular focus on Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and Small Island Developing States (SIDS), specifically Timor-Leste and Myanmar, through the implementation of the Memory of the World Programme and the UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Preservation of, and Access to Documentary Heritage, including in Digital Form (2015).
A series of national level training workshops will be held in Myanmar and Timor-Leste respectively over 2016 and 2017. It is expected that this will support the development of the National MoW Committees in the respective countries and complement ongoing efforts to safeguard and increase access to documentary heritage. Ultimately the capacity building training will directly benefit librarians, archivists and curators in their work on safeguarding and providing access to documentary heritage in their countries.
The project will also include an international symposium and consultation, to be held in Malaysia in 2017, which will result in the creation of a Southeast Asian/ASEAN action plan for the implementation of the UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Preservation of, and Access to Documentary Heritage, including in Digital Form (2015). This will involve policy makers and representatives of memory institutions from each ASEAN country as well as Timor-Leste, China, Japan and Korea.
Dr. Yasmeen Yasim, Ministry of Tourism and Culture, chaired the meeting and shared that “the stakeholders from Malaysia are looking forward to working closely with UNESCO to support the implementation of the project to bring benefit to SIDS and LDCs in the region, as well as to learn from experts involved on how to strengthen the implementation of the Memory of the World program in Malaysia.”
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