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Mission Report 2005: Old City of Sana'a (Yemen)

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Mission Report 2005: Old City of Sana'a (Yemen) UNESCO – WORLD HERITAGE CENTRE MISSION REPORT By Franca Miglioli – April 2005 Participants: Franca Miglioli, WHC Daniele Pini, consultant Saveria Teston, consultant Luca Lanzoni, consultant Date of mission: 15 – 22 April 2005 Type of travel: Technical assistance in the framework of the Italy/UNESCO Joint Declaration for the Protection of the World’s Cultural and Natural Heritage Project Title: Conservation of the Old City of Sana’a Town: Sana’a Country: Yemen Region: Arab States Budget code n°: 534GLO4000.3 CONTENTS Purpose of the mission 3 Outcome of the mission 3 Acknowledgements 4 1. Inventory of the buildings for the Old City of Sana'a 5 1.1 Background 1.2 Implementation of the project 1.3 Completion of the Inventory of the Old City 2. Extension of the inventory to the other historic settlements in the Greater Sana’a 6 3. Conservation Plan 7 4. Nomination of Marib and Baraqish 8 ANNEXES Annex 1 – Schedule of the mission Annex 2 – Inventory of the Old City of Sana’a- Final report (Abdulhakim al-Sayaghi, GOPHCY, April 2005) Annex 3 – Conservation of the Old City of Sana’a- Mission Report (Daniele 2 Pini, May 2005) PURPOSE OF THE MISSION Within the framework of the Joint Declaration on Co-operation Concerning Cultural and Natural Heritage Protection between the Italian Government and UNESCO, the purpose of the mission was to: 1. Assess the state of implementation of the project "Inventory of the buildings for the Old City of Sana'a" (AFC under the Italian FIT). 2. Define the modalities to extend the inventory to the other historic centres of the Greater Sana’a. 3. Discuss the modalities to develop the Conservation Plan under the Dutch FIT at the World Heritage Centre. 4. Meet with the concerned Yemeni authorities to discuss the possible preparation of the Nomination file for the archaeological sites of Marib and Baraqish. The contracts of the consultants Mr Daniele Pini, Ms Saveria Teston, Mr Luca Lanzoni had specific Terms of Reference. The draft of Mr Daniele Pini’s report, focused on the Conservation Plan, is annexed. The final report of Saveria Teston and Luca Lanzoni, in charge of the “Inventory of the buildings” project, is under preparation. The last two days the mission was joined by Mr Mario Caruso, consultant to the World Heritage Centre to assist the Yemeni authorities in preparing the Nomination File for the natural site of Socotra. 3 OUTCOME OF THE MISSION The Mission was carried out by Franca Miglioli, of the World Heritage Centre, accompanied by Daniele Pini, Saveria Teston and Luca Lanzoni, consultants for the project "Conservation Plan for the Old City of Sana'a". Meetings were held with representatives of the authorities involved in the implementation of this project and in the possible preparation of the Nomination file for the sites of Marib and Baraqish. For the inventory of the buildings of the Old City of Sana'a, the results obtained with the allocated funds under the Italian FIT are strongly less than expected, not more one third of the survey on the field and a minimum of the data entry. A work plan and a budget for the completion of the inventory have been prepared with the local staff of GOPHCY and CATS and submitted to the responsible person at the Social Fund for financing. New training sessions have been held in order to improve the technical skills of the survey team for the next phase, specifying the role of the different surveyors. The means to carry out the inventory of the other historic settlements of the Greater Sana'a, not included in the World Heritage site, under funds made available by CLT/CH, were discussed with GOPHCY and representatives of the University of Sana'a. The activity could be carried out this summer with the cooperation of students from the Italian University of Ferrara and the Sanani University. A draft of the work plan and budget has been agreed. To develop the Conservation Plan, the mission asked the local authorities to create a special « Sana'a Conservation Plan Unit ». The funds available for this project at the World Heritage Centre under the Dutch FIT, would be used for the international consultants, while the local staff should be financed with local resources. The project has been presented and discussed with GOPHCY, the Capital Mayor and the Social Fund, who agreed in principle. A detailed work plan has been prepared after the mission and will be transmitted through GOPHCY to the other involved authorities for approval and funding. The possible nomination of the archaeological sites of Marib and Baraqish was discussed with the President of GOAMM. A rich scientific documentation is available, but at the moment these sites, which are under excavation, are not protected by any official decree. Some of the archaeologists involved in the present campaigns and met during the mission have declared their availability in giving technical assistance to the Yemeni authorities for the preparation of the decree and of the Nomination File. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The World Heritage Centre wishes to express its gratitude to the following people: Ambassador and Permanent Delegate of Yemen to UNESCO, H.E. Dr Hamid Alawadhi, for kindly assisting in the organization of the mission; 4 Mr Ahmed M. Al-Kohlani, Capital Mayor, for his commitment towards the preservation of the Old City of Sana’a; Dr. Abdullah Zaid Ayssa, Chairman of GOPCHY and his colleague Mr Nabil A. Monassar for their professionalism and great hospitality; The advisors to CATS Miss Julia Thielebein and Miss Sandra Poschmann for their time and enthusiasm; Dr. Abdulhakim K.Al-Sayaghi of Social Fund for Development, formerly GOPHCY-CATS, for his support in the completion of the inventory of the Old City; Mr Jamal Majam of UNDP for his support and hospitality. 1. Inventory of the buildings for the Old City of Sana'a 1.1 Background In 2003, the Yemeni authorities expressed the wish to receive assistance from the WHC towards the Conservation of the Old City of Sana’a. In particular they stressed the need for an urgent inventory of the buildings of the Old City, for the definition of temporary measures of safeguard and for training in urban conservation. Under the Italian-FIT, funds were approved to carry out the Inventory of the buildings and the open spaces. UNESCO/WHC established contracts with three international experts as technical advisers and a contract with GOPHCY in order to identify and contract the local coordinator, the local experts and the surveyors, to buy the equipment and make all logistic arrangements. After the first mission of the international experts to start the project in July 2004, some technical problems occurred in the implementation of the activities. During the second mission (see the report of October 2004), a serious delay in the implementation was noted. At the end of that mission the technical problems looked solved and the result expected was the survey of around two third of the all buildings in the Old City. 1.2 Implementation of the project The mission assessed that the state of implementation of the inventory, which at the beginning of the project was supposed to be wholly carried out within the available funds, is very unsatisfactory. While the work on the ground went slowly ahead during these last months (update of cartography, compilation of the survey forms and related photos), the data entry was actually not carried out. In particular one third only of the buildings has been surveyed on the ground, whereas only the data related to one thirty of the total number of buildings have been inserted. In the activity report presented by GOPHCY, many problems have been identified (see the annexed final report) and can be summarised as follows: • lack of capacity of the survey team at the beginning, • several administrative matters, • technical problems. Some of these matters have to be clarified. 5 The administrative heavy machine of GOPHCY, together with the not “lighter” UNESCO’s one, did not allow an efficient management of the funds, for example the deadlines for the payments of the surveyors were not respected and this caused several interruptions of the activity and a general lack of confidence towards the administration. In future activities, this point cannot be underestimated and it will be necessary to identify different way for contracting the local components of the projects. Some lack of coordination has to be underlined. During the implementation of the project the difficulties arisen were never clearly communicated to the World Heritage Centre, apart of the requests for the delayed payments. The WHC together with the international experts, worried about not receiving information, decided to carry out an extra mission in October 2004, during which the major technical problems were discovered and partially solved. At the mission departure, the internet connection was available making possible a continuous communication between the experts and the survey team, but then it was not used. The chosen local GIS expert, who should have given the needed technical support to the survey team and assure the technical control on the informatics part of the work, proved to be totally inadequate and absent. Many of the surveyors decided to concentrate their work on the ground, in spite of the duties identified in their contracts. In the final report no mention on the data entry is done. Nevertheless, during this present mission, Mr Lanzoni and Ms Teston verified the correctness of the filled survey sheets and tested the existing digital data: the information resulted as reliable and complete. The survey team declared its interest in continuing the activity and the experts held additional training sessions for the surveyors finally identified as data enterers.
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