A European Union delegation headed by the Deputy Managing Director for the Americas of the European External Action Service, Javier Niño, the Deputy Director General for International Partnerships, Myriam Farran, the Director of the Task Force Energy Platform, Cristina Lobillo, and the EU Ambassador to Cuba, Isabel Brilhante, visited the Santa Clara Convent in Havana on 1 December to learn about the progress made in the restoration of this 17th century heritage building.
These works, carried out by the Office of the Historian of the City of Havana (OHCH), receive the support of the programme Transcultura: Integrating Cuba, the Caribbean and the European Union through Culture and Creativity, implemented by UNESCO and financed by the European Union, in the amount of 4.5 million dollars for the procurement and import of restoration materials.
In her welcoming remarks, the Director of the UNESCO Regional Office for Culture in Latin America and the Caribbean, Anne Lemaistre, highlighted:
We thank the European Union for its confidence in UNESCO to contribute to the recovery of this heritage property and to turn it into a driver of sustainable development for Cuba and the Caribbean, by improving the skills of the young cultural sector professionals who will be trained in this space.
Once refurbished, the building will house the Santa Clara College for Training in the Arts and Restorations Trades of Cuba and the Caribbean, aimed at training specialists from throughout the region. This centre is part of the Caribbean Cultural Training Hub promoted by Transcultura to strengthen the professionalisation of the cultural and creative sector in the region.
The representative of the Directorate General of International Partnerships praised the cross-cutting nature of the project to turn the convent of Santa Clara into a regional training centre for the Caribbean.
It is a cultural project but also one of education and exchange in the region, which is in line with what we want to support in the European Union: sustainable projects that connect people.
The OHCH team led by Perla Rosales, Deputy Director General, Nelys García, Director of International Relations and Cooperation, and Norma Trujillo, Head of Investments, welcomed the representatives of the European Union and UNESCO and accompanied them around the building to show them the project's state of implementation and the materials supplied by Transcultura.
We are working to materialise this project dreamt up by the City Historian, Eusebio Leal, and to turn it into a centre for young people and for the future, for which we thank the European Union and UNESCO for this support.
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