The Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport and the State Administration for Cultural Heritage of the People's Republic of China signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Thursday on exchange and cooperation in the area of cultural heritage. The agreement has an extendable term of five years.
Signed by the State Secretary for Culture, José María Lassalle and the Chinese Vice Minister for Culture, Li Xiaojie, the MoU provides for both governments to promote and support:
- Effective cooperation in the area of cultural heritage
- Exchanges and cooperation between managers and professionals from both countries in the area of cultural heritage, through exchange visits, joint training programmes and the exchange of information among others
- Cooperation and practical experience in terms of protecting and restoring cultural heritage and exchanges and studies on underwater archaeology. Specific institutions will be designated to coordinate amongst themselves the planning and execution of certain projects and cooperation programmes
- Exchange of information and professional studies in areas such as archives, inventories, the presentation, security control and planning of exhibitions of museum collections
- Exchanges and cooperation in candidatures for World Heritage Sites and the mutual exchange of experiences in the designation, supervision of conservation and the management of World Heritage Sites
- Exchange of information and cooperation on combating the illegal trafficking of cultural assets in line with the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Import, Export and Transfer of Illegal Ownership of Cultural Assets.
Relations between the People's Republic of China and Spain on cultural issues date back to the signing of a Cultural Cooperation Agreement in 1981. Since then, collaboration has been very active with the signing in 2013 of the Cooperation Programme in areas of Culture, Youth and Sport, the opening of a Chinese Cultural Centre in Madrid and the signing of a bilateral agreement in 2014 to regulate and boost cinematic co-productions between the two countries.
In terms of publishing, the collaboration has also been very fruitful and particularly worthy of mention are the subsidies granted for the translation to Chinese of works originally in Spanish and Spain's participation at the Beijing International Book Fair as a guest country in 2009. Performing arts is another area of cultural exchange, such as the 2014 tour by the National Dance Company of various cities in China and the tour to take place in 2016 by the Spanish National Ballet to this extensive country.
Ministerio