UNESCO's Capacity Building Course in Finland 2025

The Finnish Heritage Agency is organising a UNESCO-certified course in Finland. The course is part of UNESCO's global capacity-building training program. The trainers are UNESCO-trained facilitators for the 2003 Convention -Jorijn Neyrinck with a team of professionals from Workshop Intangible Heritage (Belgium), Matti Hakamäki from UNESCO accredited NGO Finnish Folk Music Institute and FLAME - European Centre for the Safeguarding of Living Heritage. The course is being organised now for the second time, previous was in 2018.

The course aims to deepen knowledge about the UNESCO Convention, particularly regarding the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage and the development of safeguarding plans. At the same time, the course will strengthen networking among various actors in the field of intangible cultural heritage.

Capacity building is one of the five main functions that UNESCO carries out to fulfill its mandate. The capacity-building program was established in 2009 to support countries, especially in safeguarding intangible cultural heritage and leveraging its potential for sustainable development.

The Finnish Wiki-Inventory for Living Heritage has received significant attention among communities, having gathered over 250 articles on living heritage from 400 communities in six different languages. While inventorying and raising awareness about the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage are already well underway in Finland, there is a need to strengthen expertise in developing safeguarding plans and collaboration in the field.

The course dates are 3rd and 4th November 2-4 pm (online) and 10^th and 11^th November 9 am to 4:30 pm in Hakaniemenranta 6, Helsinki. The language of the course is English

The course is free of charge and will accept a maximum of 40 participants. Participants will receive a UNESCO certificate of participation at the end of the course.

The course is organized by the Finnish Heritage Agency in cooperation with UNESCO, the Workshop Intangible Heritage (BE), and the Finnish Folk Music Institute.

The course program will be released soon.

Please register through this link by latest 20^th October 2025. We will confirm your participation by 24^th October 2025.

For more information:
Leena Marsio
leena.marsio@museovirasto.fi
+358 29533 6017

(Photo: Sanna Breilin, Finnish National Theatre / Culture kids)