[Full Text of INTERVIEW] Dr. Webber Ndoro, Director-General of ICCROM / 은도로 총장

[INTERVIEW] Webber Ndoro, Director-General of ICCROM 은도로 국제문화재복구연구센터 사무총장

Preservation and restoration of cultural artifacts is made by internationally committed study and work. The International Center for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property, ICCROM is IGO(Intergovernmental Organization) which is installed to represent more than 110 member nations to protect cultural property. By raising awareness of the importance of preserving act and of cultural property itself, ICCROM supports various activities including education, research, providing information, etc.

Korea Odyssey had an interview with Webber Ndoro, a Director-General of ICCROM.
Look into what this center do and what he has done for its aim.


국제문화재복구연구센터(ICCROM) 의 웨버 은도로 사무총장 영문 인터뷰
국제문화재복구연구센터는 문화유산을 보존하고자 설치된 정부간국제기구로, 현재 110개 이상의 회원국가를 대표하여 국제사회를 위해 봉사하고 있습니다. 문화유산 보존활동을 질적으로 향상하고, 문화적 재산의 중요성을 알리는 데 힘쓰고 있는데요. 연합뉴스 Korea Odyssey에서 문화재전문기자 김태식 단장이 국제문화재복구연구센터 웨버 은도로 사무총장을 인터뷰했습니다.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mwj5E1kUhow&t=68s

Chief of K-culture: Dr. Ndoro, we are pleased to have you here.

And I've been working here as a journalist for 30 years

And that's why I am a little familiar with the international organization called ICCROM where you're working for.

However ICCROM is still not so well known in Korea.

So the first thing I want to ask is could you tell me what kind of work or activities ICCROM does as an international organization?


Dr. Ndoro: Thank you. I think it's an understatement to say that ICCROM is not well known in Korea when you say that you have been working in heritage for more than thirty years so I'm sure ICCROM is quite well known.
And we've done a lot of activities here.

And basically ICCROM is an intergovernmental organization whose main objective is to build capacity in its member states for heritage management and that includes the conservation, preservation, presentation and interpretation of heritage.

Currently we have 137 member states throughout the world.

Chief of K-culture: Where is (the head quarter) located in?

Dr. Ndoro: Our ICCROM's head quarter is located in Rome.
We do have an office in the United Arab Emirates
But that office is specifically for a project in the Arab region


Chief of K-culture: Okay. And in Korea ICCROM is known as one of the three advisory bodies along with IUCN and ICOMOS related to UNESCO, especially the World Heritage work it manages.

IUCN is commissioned by the UNESCO world heritage center to perform tasks related to world heritage in the field of natural heritage and ICOMOS performs such tasks in cultural heritage.
I heard that these two institutions do specific things related to the inscription and deletion of World Heritage sites.

What role does ICCROM plays in this World Heritage business compared to those two organizations?

Dr. Ndoro: Thank you for the question.
As you indicate ICCROM is one of the three advisory bodies to UNESCO.
ICCROM itself is created by UNESCO in 1956 initially in India.
And that's when the call for ICCROM was made.
And our role even from the beginning was to do with training of cultural heritage experts.
Of course I did mention at the beginning that our role now is capacity building because training has evolved over the years and we now include capacity building.

And this is the same role we play for UNESCO world heritage.
Because when you nominate these sites to the list they still have to be managed.
And you still have to make sure that you have the capacity to manage them.
And this is where ICCROM comes in.
Because then we have to train the people who are managing these world heritage sites to ensure that they do not fall into the world heritage list in danger.
And our role again I want to emphasize is capacity building and advising world heritage center on issues related.

Chief of K-culture: Okay I will ask you more questions on education later.
And then, does ICCROM only work on world heritage, or does it also work in other Heritage fields that are not directly related to world heritage?

Dr. Ndoro: actually probably world heritage is probably less than one quarter of our work.
We also work in museums in promoting museums capacity building in museums, how collections are looked after by museums.
We also do work in archives and libraries.
Anything to do with cultural heritage.
And in general ICCROM is involved.
We do have several programs
And today we have four main programs which we call four flagship program.
The first one of course is the world heritage leadership program which is led by Eugene Jo.
And we also have the ATHAR program which I mentioned that we have an office in the Arab region and it's main emphasis is on archaeological and architectural conservation in that Arab region.
We do also have and a program which looks at sites or let's say heritage in danger.
And as you know today we do have a war in Ukraine and Russia and ICCROM is involved in trying to serve the cultural heritage which is being affected by that war.
That's one of our programs.
We have done that in Syria.
We have done that in Libya. (6:59)
We'll continue doing it even today.
And again the other issue which has come into play it's climate change.
I'm sure we all heard about the floods in Pakistan.
ICCROM is involved in trying to help the people of Pakistan to serve the cultural heritage there.
We also have another program the fourth program of our flagship which is the Youth Heritage Africa program where we are looking at developing the capacity of the youths in Africa in looking at cultural heritage but also trying to make sure that they can also create jobs and entrepreneurship from cultural heritage.
These are our four main flagship programs.
But we also do have other programs which we run in latin America for example, on contemporary art is one of our new projects.
We also have projects on the built heritage and sustainability.
We have another program on archives.
We have another program on collections and digital heritage.
So we have various projects which we'll run depending on the needs of our member states. (8:23)

Chief of K-culture: So many things are (happening) in the world at the same time.

In my opinion, ICCROM is an organization, as you say, that is not directly involved in the inscription on the World Heritage List, so there may be limitations in terms of so called "power," ICCROMs power, but on the other hand, I think there are many advantages as it is one step away from that. I mean the inscription is related to ...

Dr. Ndoro: Yeah yeah. But I think that could be wrong to say that we are engaged in the whole process of inscription.
But like what I mentioned is that our role is to make sure that we can understand the needs of that world heritage site in terms of and it's being looked after.
And ICCROM is engaged in the processes of a nomination but not in the same way as let's say ICOMOS for example or IUCN.

But still we are part and parts of the nomination because we have to be able to say okay is this something feasible to be nominated and be looked after? And does the country have the capacity or what are the needs for that country to be able to look after that site? So in many ways we are engaged in that process.
An it's not that we are far from that process but like what I'm saying the nomination is initially sent to World Heritage Center which then engages ICOMOS or IUCN.
But in the final analysis and panel discussions and all that ICCROM is part of those discussions because we have to also have an input into whether this is feasible to manage that site whether the capacity can be made to do that. And ICCROM has to be engaged in that.


Chief of K-culture: There are positive signs that ICCROM is getting very close to Korea recently.

Eugene, your employee who accompanied you here today, is a world heritage expert from Korea that I do respect.

I was surprised when I heard that she was going to Rome to work for ICCROM, but at the same time I thought it's such a great blessing for ICCROM to have her, right? Don't you agree?

Dr. Ndoro: No I do agree. Eugene is part and part of a big team and she's working very hard.
And this program world leadership program is a one of the flexi programs of ICCROM.
(11:41) But I want to say that we are engaged with Korea even besides her.
the professor here is in the council of ICCROM we have programs which we have been doing with Korea and the heritage organization, government heritage organization in Korea.
We have been working together I think for the past five or more years.
And now we also have, we are going into a new program
in which the both of us, the government of Korea and ICCROM we shall be working again on world heritage but also in Asia with collections with museums and so forth.
And I think I would say that Korea is working with us just like all the other
member states of ICRROM (such as) Norway for that matter and many many other countries.
And we are looking forward to increasing our activities with Korea. Not because Eugene is working for us but because we both the government of Korea and us see the need for us to cooperate and make sure that heritage is protected.

Chief of K-culture: As you said ICCROM began to connect more closely with the Korean government. Not long ago, only a month? or in two months? ICCROM ran some events in Korea and I heard that there's another event in Korea in Suwon right?

Dr. Ndoro: I think for those events I would give you to my colleague Eugene because she is the one in charge of those events and she can give you more details about the events which we did I think in August here and the event which is starting tomorrow.


Chief of K-culture: I want to ask more questions.

One of the many activities of ICCROM that I have seen and heard of is education

Usually, if you look at the educational programs run by international organizations, the target audience is university students or elites in a specific field, or professors, but ICCROM is so unique in that it provides education for practitioners who are actually in charge of World Heritage work in countries around the world.

Is this what ICCROM intended? Or did it happen by chance?

Dr. Ndoro: No it's not by chance it was from the original idea.
It was felt, as you know ICCROM when UNESCO made the pronouncements this was in reaction to what had happened in the Second World War.
A lot of buildings had been, heritage had been destroyed
and professionals who were working in the field did not know how to handle this.
So the idea was and at that time also most universities were not even training people to do this. So ICCROM then had to fill that gap.
Today even if universities are covering some of the areas they still need ICCROM to work with those who are graduating, the students, and those who are in the field ICCROM today very much wants to work with the people in the field because they are the ones who are going to get dirty, (and) Those are the ones who are going to look after our heritage.
And therefore we continue to look at the professionals or those who are going to be professionals from the university so that we can give them that capacity to ensure continuity of our heritage.


Chief of K-culture: ICCROM will need more cooperation with Korea, and the Korean government will need closer cooperation with ICCROM as well. As far as I know, the Korean government is also actively engaged in various cooperative projects, so what areas can we strengthen more for our cooperations in the future? ICCROM and the Korean government?

Dr. Ndoro: ICCROM and Korean government are working towards making sure that we cooperate on various fields.
We have identified areas for example on intangible heritage and traditional crafts.
And we have identified digital technology and heritage in some of the areas
which we are going to be working together with the university and the Korean government.
And we will begin right now.
To plan, to see what programs we can put into the field in the world.
Because again ICCROM does not work in just one country.
And whatever we do we try and meet with our member states.
And and because Korea is in Asia we will start with Asia and then expand to other areas.
And we are hoping also it is part of the problem that we will have more Koreans coming to ICCROM to work
so that the influence of Korea is also felt throughout the world.
There is a lot of good work coming from the university which we feel should also be shared with other member states.
And that way Korea benefits from collaborating with us and other member states.
ICCROM also is happy that the profession of looking after heritage places and heritage asset is improving.

Chief of K-culture: The day before yesterday maybe you gave a lecture on the heritage to students at the Korea National University of Cultural Heritage.
And I heard that I don't know what you said exactly but I heard that in relation to heritage, here and now are important.
And the future should not be bound by the past.
Could could you elaborate on it?

Dr. Ndoro: My thinking is that very much we hear about heritages about the past as if it doesn't have relevance to today.
And my definition of heritage is that it has relevance to today.
Heritage is about our identity.
It is about you being Korean right? And therefore it's about today.
Heritage is also about livelihood right? It is about food it is about jobs.
It is about the economy right? Because if those things are not stable
then it means you would not even think about preserving heritage.
There must be a benefit coming out of the heritage.
And therefore my own thinking is that heritage is about now right? It is not about the past right? Yeah. And also yes, heritage is about the future but we cannot predict what happens in the future right? If heritage contributes to the economy if it contributes to your identity, if it contributes to creation of jobs.
then yes it's about the future.
It is about the young people who we have and they are the ones who will carry on.
As long as we talk about identity we are talking about heritage because heritage is about who we are.
How do I define myself as a Korean or how do I define myself as a Zimbabwen? It is about my heritage and how I didn't share it with the others.
It is about today not what happened in 1900.
No it is about today.


Chief of K-culture: Okay thank you. This year's PNC Forum, PNC is people nature and culture.

Dr. Ndoro: Yeah.


Chief of K-culture: PNC forum in Suwon (is an) upcoming event right? And PNC forum has set the theme of the benefits of heritage right?

Dr. Ndoro: yeah.


Chief of K-culture: Very often as such benefits we talk about tourism returns or two abstract things such as so called mental healing or comfort.
I mean the heritage gives you mental healing or comfort (it seems) so abstract for me.
And what are the new benefits of heritage that ICCROM or you are paying attention to?

Dr. Ndoro: I think like what I said heritage is about your identity.
Heritage is about you, should I say your religious filling, your religious being right? And therefore it is beyond.
It's not just the economic benefits.
It is about who you are. And therefore we need to be articulating those benefits beyond just the economic benefits.
And today in the world we have so many issues and we have to be posing questions like how can we use heritage to answer some of these issues like climate change for example like how can heritage help us to do that? And at times our traditional practices can help us to overcome some of these issues.
There's also the issue of worlds right?
How can heritage help us to silence those guns which we see crying every day right?
Because again I said it's about identity but it's also about tolerating our differences.
And we need to be able to articulate that for us to begin to, perhaps have less of the conflicts.
I know that human history has always been about wars but at the same time I think we could begin to understand in the commonality which is our heritage then we might begin to make those steps.
So a heritage goes beyond just the economic benefits, tourism and all that and all that that's given right? But I'm saying we need to work harder to make sure that we achieve things like peace.
We achieve things like tackling problems of climate change and tackling problems which the world is facing.
The moment we realize that yes we are different but we have common shared heritage then there is a better chance that we will achieve peace in this world.

Chief of K-culture: Paradoxically the reason why we are emphasizing the benefits of heritage is the evidence that heritage in danger all over the world in Korea such circumstances are not much different with the benefits that you are talking about.
Really be a panacea or savior to rescue heritage from danger.

Dr. Ndoro: I think like what I said things like wars have always been part and parts for our heritage.
Wars or those conflicts or those dangers also create their own heritage unfortunately.
But I hope that if we put more emphasis on our commonality on our identities we will be able to have less of these problems.
I think it will be force for us to think that we can solve the world all the world's problems by just doing that.
But I think at least we are in a better way.
If we can all realize the importance of heritage it will help us to confront problems together.
And I would say that perhaps one of the issues we confronted recently as the world was COVID, the pandemic, I think we all tried in our own small way to cooperate and make sure that the world became a better place.
And that's the cooperation which heritage brings to us.
And I want to emphasize that it doesn't come on a silver platter.
We have to make the effort to be able to do that.
And I think heritage can give us much more than just the economic benefits which of course it's obvious.
There are economic things to get.


Chief of K-culture: Okay Ill go into another another story.
Korea and Africa and all African countries including Zimbabwe, your country share many common experiences.
In modern contemporary history in particular the two regions Korea and Africa have a painful experience of being colonized during the imperial era.
For this reason there will be maybe a lot of moves to clear up the unhappy past in the two regions.
And what do you think about the experience of a being the colonized (during) the imperial era, imperialism era experiences.

Dr, Ndoro: I'm glad you mentioned that.
I've been very much impressed by what has happened here.
This morning we visited the (contemporary) history museum , I was impressed.
At the same time I had pain because it reminds me of what has happened in Africa
and what is happening in Africa today.
And I think that we have a shared experience but I think perhaps because Korea became independent earlier you have been able to, in my view today to overcome.
And Africa unfortunately is still grappling with these issues.
And I think Africa can learn from Korea.
Personally. From a personal point of view I would wish to see more cooperation between Korea and African countries because they can learn a lot.
They can learn a lot.
I am impressed by what has happened here because you were colonized at some point but now you teach at university in Korean right? Everything is your language right? Unfortunately in Africa that's not the case.
It's either. If I give the example of myself at the moment I started going to school I was being taught in English right?
From the first grade up to ph.D level to the extent that today I struggled to read my language.
I struggle to write my language.
Even my name well Webber Ndoro, Ndoro is my saying name but my first name. I was named by a priest.
Because during that time you could not go to school with your Shona (language of Zimbabwe) name.
You could not get a birth certificate if you had a Shona name.
And I admire what his happened here right? I rarely see anything in Japanese right? Even though they were the colonizers you have made Koreans proud of their language of their culture of their heritage.
And I'm saying African states have a lot to learn.
It's not just that but also as you know you have travelled a painful past in terms of dictatorships and all that.
And unfortunately Africa is still grappling.
My own country is still grappling in this
dictatorial governments I admire because it didn't come on a silverplatter.
You had to fight for it.
You had to make sure that you get where you are now.
And that's what I admire.
And again when I went through the museum it reminded me very much of what is happening in Africa
for example. I mean my country yes it has been independent for 40 years but almost all those 40 years, probably 35 years, We have been under dictatorial powers and we still have a long way to go because in dictatorship it's very hard to economically develop.
So from my personal point of view I really wish that African countries could learn from what has happened in Korea.
I wish there could be more cooperation between Korea and Africa between universities and Korea and African universities between institutions in Africa and in Korea.
I think this could help the African countries mostly but I also think that the experience would also be beneficial to Koreans.


Chief of K-culture: Thank you, I'm going to end this interview.
And before that until now I've been asking about things I'm curious about.
But there must be something you want to tell me, tell us what I'm not curious about.
And could you tell me anything more?

Dr. Ndoro: About Korea?

Chief of K-culture: About Korea of something else

Dr. Ndoro: Like what I said. I really was touched by what I saw, the hospitality and everything which I saw in Korea.
Like what I said it really, when I went to the museum and today I've really felt pain.


Chief of K-culture: Is this your first visit to Korea?

Dr. Ndoro: Unfortunately yes we tried.
And then COVID came.
I could not come. And now at least things are better so I came.
But I would want to say that I really wish a good progress for Korea.
And I really feel that you are in the right track.

And at least if there's anything you have a cheer leader in me I will always talk about what I saw in Korea and what is happening.
Your heritage protection services are excellent I visited.
I think this was the third museum fourth museum we saw.

And everything seems to be in place.
I like the idea of having children museums specifically for children.
It's important to emphasize the children and the youth.

They are our tomorrow.
And I really think that I so far I have not seen anything.
I would say its negative.
Maybe I'm being taken to the right places.
I don't know. But infrastructure wise for a country which was colonized you have the infrastructure built.
Everything seems to be working.
I should dare say that at the risk of being deported from Italy I think things work much better here than in Italy.


Chief of K-culture: You are so interested in children, education for children in museum right?

Dr. Ndoro: yes, they are our future anyways, we cannot run away from the fact that children will inherit what we have, and if we give them rubbish it means that they will have serious issues, and if we give them something nice, it means it becomes easier for them.


Chief of K-culture: Unfortunately I've never been to Zimbabwe.

Dr. Ndoro: Please come, I'm retiring next year, I want the two of you to come to Zimbabwe.


Chief of K-culture: I would like to thank you once again for accepting our invitation and looking forward to the day.
Will meet again. Maybe in Rome.

Dr, Ndoro: either Rome or Harare (capital of Zimbabwe). Who Knows


Chief of K-culture: I wish for the infinite development of ICCROM
And the bigger trust funds from South Korea.
Dr. Ndoro: The council member is here, im sure he will convey the message to the government of Korea.

(END)