Follow-Up Activities of the Steering Committee (SC), 14 October 2020 (12th meeting) Current issues ◼ ICH NGO Conference co-organized by ICHCAP and ICH NGO Forum Sakr reported about the ongoing preparation of the conference. Caicedo helped her to establish contact with an OECD representative who will be one of keynote speakers. Sakr suggested to the Steering Committee, and members accepted, to invite Matti Hakamäki to present the objectives of the Forum’s working group in-the-making on geographical imbalance of accredited NGOs, as well as to invite additional participants representing African perspectives on ICH and resilience in crisis, such as Nyathi. Nyathi accepted the invitation; he will prepare presentation about indigenous system of knowledge in reference to COVID-19, while Sakr will contact Hakamäki regarding his participation. ◼ Next Newsletter of the Forum Once again, the members of the Steering Committee confirmed for the next Newsletter to be prepared and published before 15.COM. It will include outcomes of 8.GA and the conference co-organized with ICHCAP, our report for 15.COM and other activities attached to 15.COM, as well as material related to our General Assembly during 15.COM, including our annual report, plan for the next year and information on the election of four new members of the Steering Committee. It was decided that the deadline for completing all contributions would be 18 November. Nyathi will immediately start to collect and edit the material, relying on minutes of the Steering Committee and other sources, and present the draft versions to the members of the Steering Committee as they are drafted. ◼ Preparation of programme for 15.COM a. The work of the Election Board On 8 October, the Election Board launched a call for candidates for the Steering Committee. Four vacant seats are for the members representing the regions of Africa, Asian and Pacific states, Western Europe and North America, and the international NGOs. The deadline for applications is 5 November, while the election will take place online using online voting application on 14 and 15 December. The results will be announced on 16 December at the General Assembly of the ICH NGO Forum. Nikolov informed the Steering Committee that Desiderio checked the functionality of the chosen application called Electiobuddy, and that the complete list of accredited NGOs that are eligible to vote (one vote for each accredited NGO) has been verified. Desiderio and Nikolov will continue to serve as a technical help to the Election Board. b. ICH NGO Forum General Assembly The Forum’s General Assembly is scheduled for Wednesday, 16 December. It will be held online, through Zoom. Exact time will be defined depending on the timetable of 15.COM, and taking into account different time zones. As always, participants will need to register in advance. However, since our Zoom subscription is limited to 100 participants, after fulfilling the quota, additional participants will have opportunity to join the Assembly through live streaming on our channel on YouTube. No less than four weeks prior to the General Assembly, the Steering Committee has to propose the agenda of the General Assembly, prepare and distribute through our website and by email the annual report on the Forum’s programmes, services and partnerships, annual financial report, and annual plan providing a framework for the Forum’s activities, presented both in English and French, while the General Assembly is in charge to examine and approve these two reports and the plan (cf. Articles 9, 13, 15 and 18 of the Bylaws). The Assembly will be fully bilingual, thanks to generous support for English-French interpretation service provided by the Conseil québécois du patrimoine vivant. The Steering Committee agreed that Nikolov will announce to Desiderio and coordinate with him a series of technical services to be fulfilled during November and up to 15.COM, including the creation of registration forms, the distribution of material related to GA, as well as the distribution of the Newsletter to our member organizations, technical services to the Election Board, and technical support to online conduct of GA and other meetings attached to 15.COM. Choi will coordinate the smooth functioning of English-French interpretation, whether in a form of simultaneous or consecutive interpretation. The division of labour concerning the drafting of our annual report, annual financial report and the annual plan will be set in due time. c. ICH NGO Forum programme during 15.COM The members of the Steering Committee have examined all previous plans and subsequent suggestions related to our programme during 15.COM. They have agreed that despite disadvantageous circumstances, it is still worth trying to organize an online mini-symposium on sustainable tourism after the crises, in line with our plan of activities approved by the General Meeting in December 2019. Nömgård will contact Albert van der Zeijden, the chair of our working group on research, who is expected to coordinate the programme of the symposium. It could be held as previously planned, on Sunday, 13 December, a day prior to the start of 15.COM. Besides, Nikolov will contact chairs of all working groups, asking if they would like to organize their online meetings open to the whole membership during a week prior to 15.COM, while Nömgård will contact Jorijn Neyrinck concerning the presentation of IMP project and a capacity-building session for newly-accredited NGOs, Leena Marsio concerning the wheel chart of sustainability, and Eivind Falk concerning the #HeritageAlive! d. ICH NGO Forum report for 15.COM The report was sent to the Secretariat on 30 September. As much as possible, it was created relying on the participatory approach – from an open call to all accredited NGOs to join ad hoc working group for the preparation of the report, to the actual work of the group in question (composed of members who joined the group and members of the Steering Committee), to the feedback of the whole membership on the first draft, and, finally, to the last cycle of consultations leading to the document sent to the Secretariat. Ceribašić played a crucial role in drafting the document and coordinating the whole process. A meeting with the Secretariat regarding the report is scheduled for 22 October. Nömgård, Caicedo and Ceribašić will represent the Forum due to their functions of the chair, vice-chair and secretary of the Steering Committee. ------------------------------------ Minutes of the SC's monthly virtual meeting are uploaded a month later after the confirmation in the next meeting. See more details at the SC's Monthly Minutes. Link: http://ichngo.net/SC/Minutes

● Summary