“An optimistic conclusion of the committee is that, to date, at least, no significant risk has been recorded for a specific monument or for any element of cultural heritage attributed to the climate crisis. Of course, this does not mean that the extreme weather phenomena that are constantly increasing and that create challenges that we have to face are not negligible. “What I consider crucial is prevention, as in many other cases,” said the Minister of Culture and Sports, Lina Mendoni, in today’s press conference where the conclusions of the Working Group of the Ministry of Culture for Climate Change and Cultural Heritage were presented. in the presence of the Secretary General of Culture, George Didaskalos, the head of the Working Group, professor of EKPA, Costas Kartalis and the members of the Group.
As it was pointed out, the climate crisis has effects not only on the material monuments but also on the intangible cultural heritage, while the Ministry of Culture, having evaluated the challenges from the extreme data of this crisis, has elaborated and formed basic principles and directions for the individual units of the National Action Plan “Cultural Heritage and Climate Change”. “Our plan has a horizon of completion in 2050, with intermediate goals per decade and actions that have been specialized until 2030. Because, the phenomena are evolving, we do not know them yet, we do not know their severity, so there must be a flexibility and an adaptability “, said the Minister, pointing out some more of the conclusions of the Commission, which were presented in more detail by its head, Costas Kartalis.
One of them is that “the Ministry of Culture may need to institutionally review some of the current data. For example, it may be necessary, as each individual area and each area is studied, to re-examine and re-evaluate the boundary of the Protection Zones, because other factors will now be taken into account (eg non-arrangement of streams). Parameters in Environmental Impact Studies should also be strengthened. Another thing that one can not ignore is that in the development plans of the individual regions or regions one should now see in an important and intense way the parameter of climate change “, pointed out L. Mendoni, adding that the Commission concluded also that an electronic central platform should be created where the observations of all the services of the Ministry of Culture, of the Ephorates of Antiquities, mainly related to the effects of the climate crisis, will be recorded.
Reference was also made to the project that “DIPKA” is “running” and concerns the elaboration of management plans for the country’s monuments which have been included in the List of UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Sites. The project concerns 15 of the 18 Greek monuments included in the UNESCO list as, as it was pointed out, the old town of Corfu and the archeological site of Philippi (which were last included) already have management plans, while for Mount Athos the management plan is prepared in cooperation with the Holy Community. “The DIPKA program is being prepared from 2018, but from 2019 special emphasis was given to the effects of climate change”, the minister noted for the project included in the NSRF (budget approximately 1.5 million euros), which also provides a digital platform for the impact of climate change on monument materials, which will be integrated with the electronic central platform. In addition, DIPKA implements a maturation study on the elaboration of a comprehensive risk management plan for the archaeological sites of Mycenae, Tiryns, the Acropolis of Athens and the Monastery of Daphni, while the Ministry of Culture prepares the project climate project, with a budget of around 32 million euros, which, among others, has included works at the archeological sites of Delphi (protection from rockfall), Dion, Phaistos and Malia (flood protection works), Philippi and Mystras (fire protection).
“Indeed, the Commission considers that there is no systematic risk in terms of cultural sites, cultural heritage, from climate change. This does not mean that there are no individual dangers or extreme conditions that are formed on a case-by-case basis, as we saw this summer with the extreme weather conditions related to the heat, which caused in the second phase the aggressive and dynamic evolution of fire in Ancient Olympia “, he pointed out For his part, Professor K. Kartalis, who also stressed the need “to identify measures that move in a preventive direction so that the Ministry of Culture is ready and the country obviously to protect its cultural heritage.”
“I think that the Ministry of Culture, under the guidance and close monitoring of the Minister, is formulating an effective policy so that we can deal with and respond to the challenge of climate change. We build alliances with the other involved bodies and services and of course we cultivate synergies so that we can respond together “, noted, among others, the Secretary General of Culture.
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