IRCI held an online workshop under the project “Research on ICH Safeguarding and Disaster Risk Management”, which was divided into two sessions on 5 August and 7 September 2022. Collaborators from 7 countries in the Asia-Pacific region (Bangladesh, Fiji, Indonesia, Mongolia, the Philippines, Vanuatu, and Viet Nam) joined the workshop and had a profound discussion based on the results of desk survey they conducted in FY 2021.

In the session on 5 August, under the theme of how to safeguard intangible cultural heritage (ICH) from disasters, the collaborators reported on disaster risks ICH faces in their own countries and how such risks could be reduced. Mr R. Kodani from the Cultural Heritage Disaster Risk Management Center (CHDRMC), established in 2020 under the National Institutes for Cultural Heritage, gave a keynote presentation to share the development of the disaster risk management of ICH in Japan and the activities initiated by CHDRMC to safeguard ICH from disasters.

In the session on 7 September, overseas collaborators gave presentations and had discussions focusing on the aspects of ICH that are effective for disaster risk reduction. While the effectiveness of various local indigenous knowledge was highlighted, active discussions addressed the necessity to consider the issues related to modernization that are affecting the safeguarding of ICH in general, not just factors such as disasters and climate change, for mobilizing ICH for disaster risk reduction and management. In addition, the importance of understanding the situation of ICH and disaster risks of the community and the collaboration between ICH and DRM specialists was emphasized in implementing field research activities after the workshop.

Building upon the outcome of this workshop, field research involving local communities is programmed in each country during the latter half of FY 2022.