UNESCO. General Conference; 30th; Records ... - unesdoc - Unesco

As you will have noted, Denmark has announced its candidature for election to the Man and the
Biosphere Council at this session of the General Conference. The Greenlandic Home Rule has agreed to take part
in this programme which comprises one of the largest biosphere reserves, North-Eastern Greenland.
Culture
In culture, Denmark is currently finalizing discussions about the feasibility of ratifying the 1970
Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of
Cultural Property and the 1995 Convention on UNIDROIT.
Cultural minorities and indigenous peoples have, as all peoples and nations, a need for preserving and
restoring their cultural heritage, often disappeared or destroyed through colonization or through the influence of
stronger nations.
In this context, I wish to inform you that Denmark and Greenland already in 1983 signed an agreement
whereby a part of the cultural heritage from Greenland is being transferred from the Danish National Museum to
Greenland’s National Museum in Nuuk, Greenland. Both the Danish authorities as well as the Home Rule
Government are satisfied with the agreement, and we think that other countries could let themselves be inspired
by it. We have accordingly invited UNESCO to take part in this process.
Secondly, an essential source for the understanding of our history and international history is not
protected against treasure hunters and random looting, namely the underwater cultural heritage. Denmark has
therefore accepted to head a group of experts working on the elaboration of a convention on underwater cultural
heritage. The work is well under way, but not yet finished, and Denmark therefore supports the prolonging of the
group’s mandate.
Communication
UNESCO’s policy in the field of information should have two major aims.
Firstly, to promote and strengthen public access to knowledge, information and culture through libraries,
archives and information centres, whether in printed or in outline form. In order to ensure human rights, both
children and adults – women as well as men, girls as well as boys – should have access to the above-mentioned.
Secondly, to promote development of balanced copyright regulations to support both public and
commercial interests.
As is well known, Denmark has over a number of years supported the Intergovernmental Programme for
the Development of Communication (IPDC) through contributions to IPDC’s voluntary fund and through fundsin-trust.
Denmark remains the single largest contributor to this programme. We have therefore decided to present
our candidature for a post on the Council of the IPDC at this session of the General Conference.
Girls and women in developing countries
Denmark urges UNESCO to give priority to girls’ and women’s issues in all activities of the
Organization. There is a great need to direct attention towards girls and women; mostly so in developing
countries and especially in the field of education.
Planning and policies
Strategic planning is deficient. It does not deal with important policy questions in a formal way. Neither
does it deal with programme and project sustainability issues and linkages between strategic and operational
activities. Monitoring and evaluation are also not fully utilized although there are important lessons to be learned
from these.
Personnel
Despite all initiatives, overall progress in implementing reforms has been slow. UNESCO’s personnel
policy has led to an organization which is very top-heavy. It is time for UNESCO to bring its personnel function
in line with the developments in human resource management and to become strategic.
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