Southwest Pacific Cultural Heritage Training Program

SOUTHWEST PACIFIC CULTURAL HERITAGE TRAINING PROGRAM

THIRD WORKSHOP – SEPTEMBER 2003

BUKA ISLAND, NORTH SOLOMONS PROVINCE

DATE: 29/09/03 – 01/10/03

VENUE: BAMBOO SHADE (UNIVERSITY CENTRE, BUKA, NSP)

CHAIRMAN: DEMAS KAVAVU (MAIMAI)

SECRETARY: VINCENT KEWIBU

SPECIAL COMMITTEE: FRANCIS RANGATIN, BLAISE WATETE & HUGO KOP

Group Recommendations

1. Legislation: Review the National Museum and Art Gallery (1992) and the National Cultural Commission Acts (1994).

• Set up a committee to review the Acts.
• Provide a venue and funding for a workshop after the SWPCHTP (2004 onwards) to discuss the two Acts with all stakeholders involved in cultural resource management (including local communities, local level gov’t, provincial gov’t and national statutory bodies) in order to review and make amendments.
• Set a time frame for the Acts to be reviewed and amended –say, every 5-10 years.

Action to be led by Ombone Kaiku and Michael Epoko (National Cultural Commission) and Herman Mandui (National Museum & Art Gallery) for the review and amendment of the legislations.

1. Education and Training: The discussion group recommends that:

• Each province to identify, organise and train volunteer fieldworkers in cultural heritage from cultural groups to assist and report to the provincial cultural officers.
• Target UPNG graduates who specialize in social sciences, natural and physical sciences, economics and law to work in the provinces and assist provincial cultural officers.
• That personal should be educated and trained to work in fields like anthropology, archaeology, sociology and related subjects dealing with cultural heritage management. There should be avenues or training programs put in place where cultural officers would be engaged in programs like job attachments and short training programs with relevant institutions (like NM & AG, National Cultural Commission and UPNG) to improve their skills and make their work more effective.

Action should be taken by Provincial Cultural Officers with the assistance of the National Museum & Art Gallery, National Cultural Commission and University of PNG through its provincial centres in arranging these programs as a way of capacity building of cultural heritage management officers.

1. Curriculum: The discussion group recommends that:

• That appropriately tailored curriculum for cultural education and cultural heritage management is developed for teaching at all levels of the education system in Papua New Guinea. These include elementary, primary, secondary and tertiary levels.

Action to be taken by cultural officers – that is to visit, liaise, organise and give talks to elementary, primary and secondary schools in each of their provinces. For the University Centres (adult matriculation) and tertiary institutions, the centre directors work together with appropriate departments at UPNG (School of Humanities & Social Sciences) to incorporate courses relating to cultural heritage management (archaeology, anthropology, etc.) in the CTCS and BED programs.

1. Funding: The discussion group recommends that:

• Funding is sourced by relevant national statutory bodies and provinces involved with cultural heritage management from the national government, donor agencies, concessional loans and private sector sponsorship in order to implement their cultural heritage management and development programs

• All provincial cultural centres should submit information regarding the establishment of their cultural centres to the National Cultural Centre for the purpose of incorporating it with the national cultural centre establishment for funding from JICA.
• Participants consider the Sasakawa Trust Fund for renewal and extension of their financial assistance to fund some of the recommendations/resolutions.

Action 1: Each provincial cultural officer to write to the National Planning Office to request for the list of donor agencies and information regarding funding for cultural centres and cultural activities.

Action 2: Sourcing of information re. Funding be headed by NM & AG and National Cultural Commission, and disseminated to Provincial Cultural Officers.

1. Institutional Communication/Networking: The discussion group recommends that:

• Institutional relationships – that the NM & AG and the National Cultural Commission, the provincial cultural officers and all stake holders, both in the country and overseas, establish a more coordinated network and linkages and work together to preserve, protect and promote Papua New Guinea’s cultures. This can be achieved by way of improving communication facilities (telephones, internet, radio, television, the print media and by post) to update changes and developments, laws and related information dealing with cultural heritage management.

• All provinces in PNG should have cultural centres so that some functions can be transferred to them from such institutions as National Cultural Centres, NM & AG or National Research Institute.
• Cultural centres should be built with University centres as the land is secured already and that they should be resource centres housing a museum, library and other facilities like computers, etc.

Action 1: Radio Program(s) – Mr. Arifaea to compile the program (scripts) recorded for each or group of workshop participants regarding cultural heritage and a time schedule be set to be aired by NBC. Each provincial cultural officer or university director to run a series radio programs in his or her province.

Action 2: Firstly, newsletters for the National Museum & Art Gallery (Museum Dekenai) and the National Cultural Commission (Culture Link) exist, so provincial cultural officers to submit their addresses to the two respective institutions for a copy of the newsletter (free of charge) and also to submit news from the cultural centres of their activities. Probably, two pages would be allocated to publish Provincial Cultural Centres’ news so that other provinces and the national bodies (NMAG and NCC) will be informed of each other activities and roles.