Wednesday 05 / August / 2026
Paris: — The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has adopted the "Cultural Property" initiative for pottery, copper, metal, and woodworking crafts submitted by the Bahla Volunteer Team, a local community organization, at the historic Bahla Fort site in A’Dakhiliyah Governorate.
The Ministry of Heritage and Tourism participated in the initiative for the first time in cooperation with the Oman National Commission for Education, Culture and Science, as part of the World Heritage Volunteers (WHV) 2026 campaign under the slogan "Working on the Future," organized by the UNESCO World Heritage Centre. This step reflects the role of the Sultanate of Oman in preserving and managing registered World Heritage sites of Outstanding Universal Value.
The World Heritage Volunteers initiative was established in 2008 within the framework of the World Heritage Education Programme to promote a culture of volunteerism and engage youth and community institutions in protecting and promoting heritage globally. Its membership comprises 200 organizations from 84 countries and more than 10,000 national and international volunteers.
The Sultanate of Oman's participation in this initiative marks it as the second country in the Arab region after the Kingdom of Morocco, owing to its significant role in preserving global cultural heritage. The initiative represents a model of partnership between the Ministry of Heritage and Tourism and local community institutions in line with the Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention, thereby enhancing community participation in protecting and managing sites of Outstanding Universal Value and embodying the concept of effective partnership in heritage conservation.
This participation aims to highlight the Sultanate of Oman's efforts in preserving World Heritage, as well as preserving traditional craft knowledge and skills and transmitting them to future generations—particularly in pottery, copper and metalworking, and woodworking crafts, as these crafts constitute true pillars for the artistic, technical, economic, and social sustainability of society.
Moreover, this participation also aims to involve youth in preserving World Heritage through tangible on-site projects, enabling them to learn essential preservation and maintenance skills and techniques, building their capacities as future decision-makers and active global citizens, strengthening sustainable cooperation between community institutions and the Ministry of Heritage and Tourism, raising awareness among youth, volunteers, and relevant entities regarding the need to protect and promote World Heritage, and identifying best practices by developing non-formal education tools to facilitate the involvement of community stakeholders in World Heritage education.
The implementation of the initiative submitted by the Bahla Volunteer Team will begin from 3 to 13 September at the Bahla Fort site in A’Dakhiliyah Governorate. It is organized by the Ministry of Heritage and Tourism in cooperation with the Ministry of Education—represented by Oman National Commission for Education, Culture and Science—and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Youth, with the participation of the SMEs Development Authority “Riyada” and the Bahla Volunteer Team, as well as international and local volunteers representing several countries, thereby enhancing cultural exchange and the sharing of expertise and experiences in heritage preservation.
Ali Said Al Adawi, Acting Director of the Bahla Fort Site, said that the Ministry of Heritage and Tourism's participation in the World Heritage Volunteers 2026 initiatives, "Working for the Future," contributes to raising awareness among youth, volunteers, and stakeholders about the need to protect World Heritage, highlighting the Sultanate of Oman's efforts in this area, and establishing crafts as cultural property that must be preserved from extinction.
Al Adawi added that participating projects must be located at a site inscribed on the World Heritage List or the Tentative List, build effective partnerships with the local community and relevant entities to enhance project impact and the sustainability of its outputs, include awareness activities and workshops, have a legally registered applicant in the country, and be implemented on a non-profit basis.
He explained that selected initiatives will receive financial support to empower them to implement their projects. The World Heritage Centre will also grant official international recognition to the organizing entity and volunteers, and UNESCO will promote successful initiatives by publishing their content on the organization's official website and presenting them at international conferences, positively contributing to the tourism sector and introducing the sites globally.
For his part, Sultan Nasser Al Nabhani, Head of the Bahla Volunteer Team, stated that this initiative will yield results that benefit the heritage site—Bahla Fort—which was inscribed 40 years ago as the first Omani site on the World Heritage List. He pointed out that this initiative represents the team's first international experience, with hopes of benefiting from other global experiences in the field of voluntary work.
