UNESCO-CMAS Underwater Cultural Heritage 25 years
In 2001 several countries and organisations signed the UNESCO convention for the protection of the underwater cultural heritage. Of course, CMAS was one of the organisations that fully supported this aim. After these 25 years it is obvious that it is still necessary to pay attention to this item. Not only old issues like ignorance and unskilful approach but also new threats like big scale looting and climate change needs to be considered. Time for renewal of the commitment.
Celebration
Prof Emad Khalil, UNESCO chair of underwater cultural heritage and our director of scientific diving of CMAS, organized an international meeting in Alexandria on the 20th of August. Many speakers and visitors came to this event organized in the famous bibliotheca of Alexandria. Thanks to the help of the Egyptian Diving and Lifesaving organisation, recreational diving was one of the issues of the congress. John Geurts, president of the Science and Sustainability Committee of CMAS spoke about the education of scientific divers according to CMAS and ISO standards. And he also announced the important role that recreational divers will play soon with the renewal of the citizen science courses.
UNESCO-CMAS day of Underwater Cultural Heritage
A celebration once in 25 years is not enough, considering the problems that protection of the underwater world encounters these days. That is one of the reasons that it was decided to have a yearly day of the protection of the underwater cultural heritage. It is set on the 21st of August, the day that the first convention was signed.
Alexandria declaration
The world has changed rapidly the last 25 years. There has been remarkable progress achieved in the protection through regulations, international cooperation and scientific research. But is also clear that the old convention has to be updated. So, before and during the congress a new declaration about the protection has been formulated. Because of the meeting and the first day of the protection it has been called The Alexandria declaration. After official acceptance by UNESCO, it will be published on this website. It will be a guideline for CMAS in the near future.
