At the session held this Friday the 12th, a pilot of the platform that UNESCO will launch next year was presented to the Committee in order to provide visibility and strengthen the Register of Good Safeguarding Practices for intangible cultural heritage. Among the 14 reference experiences in intangible heritage, the Ponte…nas ondas! initiative was presented, described by the Secretariat as one of the best examples of safeguarding.
Model for the platform
UNESCO highlighted that, during the initial technical development of the platform, the goal was to create an enhanced digital experience for the selected safeguarding practices. When projecting the pilot of the new platform with images of Ponte…nas ondas!, it was explained that the platform will adopt an interactive narrative format, allowing users to exchange their resources associated with each safeguarding practice in an intuitive and dynamic way. As an example, they highlighted the work being developed by an NGO called Ponte…nas ondas!, based on a radio initiative carried out in Galicia and Northern Portugal. By using this methodology, tested for the platform and accompanied by PNO! imagery, it was underlined that the project aims to present in a visually attractive and interactive way the different safeguarding approaches, the strategies applied by participating communities, schools or organizations, to meet specific needs — in this case, promoting intergenerational dialogue and generating greater interest among young people regarding the shared cultural heritage of both countries.
The idea is that an interactive presentation of this kind, like the one shown through the example of Ponte…nas ondas!, may be applied to a limited number of experiences across various thematic areas in the future version of the platform.
In this platform, UNESCO values the innovative threefold strategy of PNO!, which brings together education, communication and heritage, and highlights in particular that the PNO! model, besides strengthening cultural ties across the border, has fostered intergenerational dialogue and awakened greater interest and awareness among young people involved about their shared cultural heritage. UNESCO emphasizes that the participatory methodologies developed by PNO! constitute “a powerful framework for fostering international dialogue while ensuring the intergenerational transmission of shared cultural traditions.”
Next steps
At the beginning of 2026, the Secretariat will create an advisory group responsible for monitoring the development of the platform, supervising it and incorporating 60 safeguarding experiences following the pilot phase in order to validate the methodology. Based on these developments, the platform will become operational throughout 2026, and its launch will take place during the 21st Session of the Intergovernmental Committee for ICH, followed by a second phase incorporating new experiences in 2027.
Words of appreciation
After the presentation, various representatives of States on the Committee and other Member States took the floor. The first to intervene was the representative of Spain, María Agúndez, who expressed gratitude for the support received for the creation of the new platform. She highlighted the Ponte…nas ondas! initiative and the long process of inscription in the Register of Good Safeguarding Practices — over ten years of work. She praised Ponte…nas ondas! as a very dedicated and persistent bearer community in the development of its good practice.
Interventions were then made by representatives of Slovakia, Nigeria, Barbados, Haiti, Paraguay, Brazil, Belgium, Czechia, Finland, India, Norway, the United Kingdom, Korea and Indonesia. All acknowledged the need to promote good practices in intangible cultural heritage and the opportunity the new platform will offer, congratulating the Secretariat for driving this new initiative.
