Round up
New cultural focus of Spanish co-operation
Culture as a human development objective is being propelled by the government of Spain’s Prime Minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. An innovative strategy launched at the end of 2007, which marks a radical change in the relationship between culture and development, is now bearing fruit. At an international level, Spain’s signing of the Convention on the Protection and Promotion of Diversity of Cultural Expression of the United Nations Educational and Scientific Organisation (UNESCO), demonstrates the country’s belief that cultural diversity is a driving force for development.
Training project and contemporary dance workshop in Angola of Fernando Hurtado Company, financied by AECID.
© AECID
ACP countries stand to benefit from the new focus on culture and development. The sector is one of eleven focal areas of Spain’s development cooperation policy. Within it, seven new action areas are being developed: training human capital for cultural management; political aspects of culture; economic aspects of culture; education and culture; cultural heritage; communication and culture and cultural rights.
Specific programmes such as ACERCA (cultural management), FORMART (education and culture) and support for newly-created businesses (economy and culture) have been mounted. The grants programme for scientific cooperation is being extended, as are the resources available for the programme to encourage inter-university cooperation with higher education institutions in both Africa and Latin America.
With the implementation of Plan África, a growing openness to ACP countries is being promoted and especially African countries of the group. The Network of Spanish Cultural Centres Abroad (151 centres in 107 countries) has been strengthened, as have spaces for cultural exchange and dialogue through the creation of Casa África, Casa Árabe, Casa Asia, Casa Sefarad (Sephardic) and Casa América Catalunya. (Africa House, Arabia House, etc.). A network of Arabic libraries has also received increased support, and the Cinema of the Southern Hemisphere Support Forum has been set up. Alongside these, the newly-created Bank of Good Practices in culture and development projects compiles records of successful outcomes and evaluates the impact of cultural cooperation.
There’s additional support too for multilateral institutions focused on culture such as UNESCO-funded initiatives for African regions, and for the Iberamerican cultural space initiative to create new summit programmes. Spain has also increased its presence in international organisations and institutions with cultural agendas.
Moreover, the Spain-United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Millennium Objectives Fund recently made culture and development one of its five key priorities, allocating over US$95M for this purpose. Among its initial beneficiaries will be several ACP countries: Ethiopia, Mauritania, Namibia, Senegal and Mozambique.
At an international level, the signing of UNESCO’s Convention on the Protection and Promotion of Diversity of Cultural Expression illustrates the country’s belief that cultural diversity is a driving force for development. The new strategy is also in line with the 2003 Dakar ACP policy declaration, the ACP cultural industries action plan, as well as the 2006 Santo Domingo declaration.
Statistics in the Report of the Aid and Development Committee, which contains an evaluation of Spanish Cooperation over the last five years, show that Spain is in an ideal position to meet its cooperation and development objectives and to fulfil Premier Rodríguez Zapatero’s commitment to reach the target of 0.7 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) going to development cooperation by 2012. This means that Spain is well-placed to be one of the principal global providers of Public Aid for Development in the near future.
* Expert in International Cultural Cooperation
For further information: http://www.aecid.es/09cultural/02ccult/9.2.1.htm
