UNESCO backs university-based heritage centres across Africa

UNESCO is supporting the establishment of campus-based heritage studies resource centres and World Heritage courses at universities in five African countries as part of a pilot programme that will eventually grow into a 30-member university network linked to UNESCO Chairs.

The five countries participating in the programme are South Africa, Cameroon, Morocco, Senegal and Tanzania.

UNESCO press officer Nolwazi Mjwara told University World News in an interview that a meeting was held in February 2026 to map the way forward in implementing the programme.

She said that, following that meeting, the next step is to convene the five pilot universities and L’École du patrimoine africain (The African Heritage School, or EPA) to draft tailored roadmaps and implementation calendars.

EPA is a pan-African institution in Porto-Novo, Benin, which trains professionals and students in the conservation and management of cultural heritage such as museums and archives.

Mjwara said the five pilot universities involved in the programme are the University of Cape Town, the University of Yaoundé II, Mohammed VI Polytechnic University, Cheikh Anta Diop University and the College of African Wildlife Management Mweka, Tanzania.

She said the heritage initiative will run until 2027, but the plan is ultimately to increase the number of participating universities.

“The main goal is to institutionalise World Heritage development in Africa by anchoring it in universities and heritage institutions, rather than relying only on short-term workshops. In practical terms, the project is building durable curricula, accredited training pathways, advisory support and a pan-African university network to strengthen heritage identification, conservation, management and nomination,” said Mjwara.

Expanding the network

She said this is a Korean Funds-in-Trust pilot project and the wider plan is to expand it into a broader network.

Korean Funds-in-Trust is a channel through which the Republic of Korea makes voluntary contributions to United Nations agencies – especially UNESCO and the World Intellectual Property Organization, or WIPO – to bankroll specific development projects in other countries.

“Beyond the project itself, UNESCO and the African World Heritage Fund plan to sustain a 30-university network and build on the results through a two-phase nomination programme scheduled for 2027,” added Mjwara.

She said the initiative is part of the United Nations agency’s organisation-wide strategic priority for the African continent.

Mjwara said UNESCO’s Strategy for Priority Africa (2022-29) has a component that focuses on fostering cultural heritage and development, including through World Heritage.

She said the strategy explicitly calls for increasing the number of African heritage experts, strengthening the role of African universities in World Heritage processes, developing networks, and linking heritage with sustainable development, entrepreneurship and innovation.

“This is why strengthening World Heritage courses and creating campus-based initiatives are central to the current strategy and approach in Africa. They are practical tools for embedding expertise in African institutions, promoting South-South and North-South cooperation, and making heritage education more relevant to jobs, local development and long-term stewardship of cultural and natural heritage,” she added.

Flagship programmes and partnerships

In total, UNESCO’s Operational Strategy for Priority Africa has five flagship programmes whose aim is to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals and the African Union’s Agenda 2063, which champions “an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa, driven by its own citizens, representing a dynamic force in the international arena”.

Apart from heritage, the other flagship programmes include Campus Africa, which seeks to reinforce higher education in Africa; the General History of Africa, which seeks to deepen scientific production on the history of Africa; Open Science to reinforce capacity-building in basic and applied sciences and scientific research to strengthen innovation and technology development; and harnessing new and emerging technologies for sustainable development in Africa, including improving the capacity of African countries in the adoption and implementation of artificial intelligence (AI), building multiple partnerships to support the ethical application of AI, using AI to address environmental challenges in Africa, and strengthening gender equality in the design and use of AI systems.

Mjwara said participating universities in the programme to institutionalise World Heritage development in Africa will be linked to African and international academic partners.

“The wider plan is to expand this into a broader network with additional African universities and UNESCO Chairs,” she added.

UNESCO Chairs are university-based posts linking higher education and research institutions worldwide to UNESCO’s priorities – education, science, culture, communication, gender equality, sustainability and heritage, among others.

In 2020, the University of Botswana started hosting its UNESCO Chair – the UNESCO Chair on African Heritage Studies and Sustainable Development – making it the first UNESCO Chair of its kind in Africa.

This followed UNESCO’s approval of the university’s 2018 proposal to establish the programme, with Dr Susan Keitumetse appointed as chairholder due to her expertise and experience in heritage studies and sustainable development.

A statement by the University of Botswana said the programme provides a platform for driving research, teaching and policy engagement on African heritage and international sustainable development.

“Other general objectives of the UNESCO Chair on African Heritage Studies and Sustainable Development are to enhance interaction between academia and practitioners where cultural heritage matters are concerned. In addition, it is to disseminate modern heritage conservation knowledge and practices to practitioners, local actors and government officials from Botswana, the Southern African region, and the African continent,” reads part of the statement.

“It will further conduct research on heritage in trans-boundary environments of Southern Africa as well as create cross-sector interaction and idea-sharing collaboration on heritage and sustainability matters.”