Overview

Description

The ‘Protecting Cultural Heritage from the Consequences of Disasters’ (PROCULTHER) project aims at supporting national response efforts when disasters strike. Its goals include developing a common European methodology along with standard operating procedures for protecting cultural heritage during emergencies; promoting the development of preparedness arrangements; and creating a multi-national, multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral asset able to provide guidance on developing preparedness measures to protect cultural heritage during emergencies and intervening globally in the case of an international emergency.

Cultural heritage is a primary source of identity for people. It is therefore the core of social wellbeing and resilience of individuals and communities. Cultural heritage is also an important contributor to European and world economies, as heritage tourism is generating ever increasing revenues.

In the European Union, which declared 2018 the European Year of Cultural Heritage, tourism accounts for 10% of GDP and 12% of employment. Recent earthquakes in Italy in 1997, 2009, 2016–2017, in Haiti in 2010 and in Nepal in 2016 demonstrated how vulnerable cultural heritage is to the impact of natural disasters The Union Civil Protection Mechanism (UCPM) considers cultural heritage protection in emergency an important civil protection sector. PROCULTHER builds on recent experiences involving the protection of cultural heritage during disasters in Italy, France, Spain and Turkey, on the achievements of the EU-funded PROMEDHE project and on available tools and methods developed by relevant international organisations.

Project content

Related projects

PROCULTHER-NET

Protecting Cultural Heritage from the Consequences of Disasters-Network

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Outputs & results

Partner organisations