UN marks World Day for Audiovisual Heritage

The UN today observed the World Day for Audiovisual Heritage with an array of activities and events to remind the nations of the vital importance of collecting, documenting, preserving and safeguarding their audiovisual heritage.

The World Day for Audiovisual Heritage is a commemoration of the adoption, in 1980 by the UNESCO 21st General Conference, of the Recommendation for the Safeguarding and Preservation of Moving Images. The World Day provides an occasion to raise general awareness of the need to take urgent measures and to acknowledge the importance of audiovisual documents.

Discover, remember and share " is the theme of this year's celebration of the World Day for Audiovisual Heritage (27 October).

The UAE pays significant attention to its rich audiovisual assets and intangible heritage as part of efforts to preserve and promote UAE values, principles, customs and traditions..

 As the country's leading research and archival institution, the National Archives (NA), owns an impressive audiovisual collection and repository (photographs, films and recordings).

The NA's Oral History Project records and documents the history and intangible heritage of the United Arab Emirates through oral narratives and firsthand accounts stored in the memories of elderly people and witnesses to the times.

The NA keeps thousands of photos, videos and records on a wide range of topics including those of the late founding father, Sheikh Zayed,UAE ruling families, and social economic, political, administrative, religious and educational life.

In 2014, the National Archives, joined the International Oral History Association, the first Arab state to do so.

In 2015, the International Advisory Committee for the Memory of the World programme, which is affiliated with the Organisation of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, UNESCO,chose the UAE as Chair of the programme until 2018.

Established in 1992,UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme is an international initiative launched to safeguard the documentary heritage of humanity against collective amnesia, neglect, the ravages of time and climatic conditions, and willful and deliberate destruction.

In her message on the day, Director-General of UNESCO Ms Irina Bokova said,''Through images and sound, audiovisual heritage provides unique insight to the past as the basis for looking to the future. This heritage carries memories and testimonies, knowledge and ideas, in ways that are vivid and moving and that lay the foundations for better understanding and dialogue between and within generations, as well as between and within societies. Linking the past to the present, this heritage is part of our common history, and must be safeguarded and shared as a wellspring of identity and belonging, innovation and creativity.

''Films, recorded sound materials, radio and television programmes -- archives are essential for the preservation of this heritage, offering us a chance to look to our history and that of others as threads in the great mosaic story of all humanity, on the basis of respect and tolerance. Threats to these archives come from many directions, starting with neglect and chemical decay and including technological obsolescence.''

This. she noted, is why UNESCO is working with Governments across the world to safeguard audiovisual heritage as a source of strength for all to share -- to allow women and men today and tomorrow to continue discovering, remembering and sharing the heritage that makes us who we are.