World Heritage Convenes in New Zealand
24 May 2007
New Zealand will host the World Heritage Committee’s annual meeting for the first time in July 2007.
The 31st Session will be held in Christchurch from 23 June to 2 July 2007 and will be chaired by Tumu te Heuheu, Paramount Chief of Ngati Tuwharetoa (one of the main Maori tribes in the Central North Island) and New Zealand’s World Heritage representative for the last 10 years.
Over 600 international delegates are expected to attend the meeting, which is closed to the public. The committee will consider new World Heritage site nominations, sites in danger, site management and protection, and national tentative lists for possible future sites.
In 1972, UNESCO adopted the World Heritage Convention as a way to encourage the identification, protection and preservation of the world’s most outstanding cultural and natural heritage sites. With 183 member countries and more than 800 sites, it is one of the most widely supported United Nations’ conventions.
New Zealand has three World Heritage sites which, like the Acropolis and the Grand Canyon, possess what the World Heritage Convention states as ‘outstanding universal value’:
- Tongariro National Park
The mountains at the heart of this park have cultural significance for the Maori people and symbolise the spiritual links between the community and its environment. The park is home to active and extinct volcanoes and a diverse range of ecosystems. It was the first site to be inscribed on the World Heritage list as a cultural landscape.
- Te Wāhipounamu - South West New Zealand World Heritage Area
This area includes the Fiordland, Mt Aspiring, Westland and Aoraki/Mount Cook National Parks comprising 10 percent of New Zealand’s land mass. The region has been shaped by successive glaciations into fiords, rocky coasts, towering mountains, ancient beech forests, lakes and waterfalls.
- The Sub-Antarctic Islands of New Zealand
In the Southern Ocean, The Snares, Bounty, Antipodes, Auckland and Campbell Islands are an outstanding World Heritage site. They are home to an extraordinary wealth of biodiversity and a high density of rare wildlife populations.
Media interested in attending and covering the World Heritage Committee meeting must register online at www.31whc.org
|
