The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST) announced on December 24 that on December 20, 2024, Reuters reported that the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) will deploy a team of experts to conduct a field survey in Ha Long Bay to further strengthen protection measures for this site.
UNESCO has reviewed and approved Vietnam's report on Ha Long Bay - Cat Ba Archipelago.
This is one of the contents that the Vietnamese delegation attending the 46th Session of the World Heritage Committee from July 21 to 31, 2024 discussed and agreed upon with the UNESCO World Heritage Center, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS).
At its 46th Session in 2024, the World Heritage Committee examined reports on the state of conservation of 123 World Heritage sites, including 56 World Heritage sites on the List of World Heritage in Danger (Vietnam has never had any World Heritage sites included in this List up to now).
The 46th session of the World Heritage Committee recognized 24 new World Heritages. Accordingly, to date, there are 1,223 World Heritages worldwide (including 952 World Cultural Heritages, 231 World Natural Heritages, and 40 Mixed World Heritages).
At the same time, the World Heritage Committee decided to remove one heritage site, Niokolo-Koba National Park (Senegal), from the List of World Heritage in Danger and to add one heritage site, Saint Hilarion Monastery/Tell Umm Amer (Palestine), to the List of World Heritage in Danger, due to threats to this heritage from the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip. Thus, up to now, there are still 56 World Heritage sites on the List of World Heritage in Danger.
Regarding Ha Long Bay, the 45th Session of the World Heritage Committee in 2023 made recommendations on the conservation and promotion of the value of this heritage. Through monitoring the heritage conservation activities and Vietnam's report, the 46th Session of the World Heritage Committee made 8 recommendations on the conservation of the World Heritage Ha Long Bay - Cat Ba Archipelago, specifically:
In the first four recommendations, UNESCO confirmed that it had reviewed and approved Vietnam's report on Ha Long Bay - Cat Ba Archipelago, including the report on the conservation status and the establishment of an effective coordination mechanism between Quang Ninh province and Hai Phong city to ensure integrated management of the heritage.
Recommendation 5, UNESCO notes that controlling the implementation of projects in heritage protection areas requires heritage impact assessment according to the guidelines of the 1972 UNESCO Convention... Specifically, construction projects must be assessed for the appropriateness of the project's impact on the outstanding universal value of the heritage according to UNESCO's guidelines for assessing world heritage impacts.
Recommendation 6: UNESCO acknowledges and appreciates Quang Ninh province for implementing comprehensive measures to address waste and environmental pollution to maintain air and water quality within acceptable limits. However, attention should still be paid to controlling water pollution.
Recommendation 7: UNESCO requests the submission to the World Heritage Center of a detailed zoning map of the Ha Long Bay - Cat Ba Archipelago World Heritage Site, after the Ha Long Bay World Heritage Site is expanded to include Cat Ba Archipelago.
Recommendation 8 is to invite a UNESCO feedback monitoring mission to assess the overall status of heritage conservation, especially heritage management and the effectiveness of heritage protection management organizations.
During the 46th Session of the World Heritage Committee, Director of the Lazare Eloundou Assomo World Heritage Center considered Vietnam as a model of cooperation with UNESCO and UNESCO's Advisory Bodies and a typical case of world heritage conservation. He highly appreciated Vietnam's continued research on the unique cultural values of Ha Long Bay - Cat Ba Archipelago to build a dossier, supplement cultural criteria for Ha Long Bay - Cat Ba Archipelago, as well as continuing to accompany and support Vietnam in this research content. Accordingly, UNESCO pledged to continue to support Vietnam in building and promoting the heritage dossiers that Vietnam proposed in the coming time.
“Thus, in the coming time, when the UNESCO Expert Delegation visits Ha Long Bay for a field survey as reported by Reuters, we need to closely follow the recommendations of the Field Inspection Delegation to explain and accept the advice and comments of the UNESCO Expert Delegation in the work of protecting Ha Long Bay. As well as Vietnam's wishes to continue researching and supplementing cultural values (especially the potential cultural and historical values of Ha Long Bay with the archaeological cultures of Soi Nhu - Cai Beo - Ha Long), moving towards preparing a dossier to nominate Ha Long Bay - Cat Ba Archipelago as a World Heritage Site with additional cultural criteria according to the regulations in the Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention" - the Department of Cultural Heritage emphasized.
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