The Flemish Unesco Commission’s central task is to function as a go-between for Flanders with Unesco (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization). Focusing on education and science, culture and heritage, media and communications, Unesco is essentially the United Nations’ cultural arm.

Flanders’ commission works on many fronts but has struggled to bring visibility to the broad scope of its work in recent years. Marc Vervenne, a professor in Hebrew studies at the University of Leuven and the president of the commission since 2010, says that the average Fleming doesn’t know much about the commission. “Or when you talk about Unesco, they think it’s about World Heritage, bricks and stones – and that’s it,” he says. Under the stewardship of Vervenne, of vice-president Stefaan De Ruyck and of former secretary-general Jan De Bisschop, the commission has increasingly streamlined its activities and attempted to expand its appeal, mapping out a policy and work programme for the first time in its nine-year history. “It’s rather complex; it’s like an octopus now,” says Tijs D’Hoest, the current secretary-general. The commission has also begun to reach out to the national commissions of neighbouring countries, particularly those of Germany and the Netherlands.

“The strategy and the working procedures of the commission have profoundly changed over the years,” explains Vervenne. He says the impetus to reach out came from both the members’ heartfelt conviction in the importance of the commission’s work and, on a more practical level, their busy agendas.

“Each of us has his or her own job; we are not paid for the commission work,” he explains. “We have tried to make clear that, as a commission, we want to have an impact. We are not there to play to the gallery. We are convinced that Unesco is important and, in line with that, that the Unesco national commissions must have an impact in society and in politics as well.”

Stopping politicisation

So from 2010, the members began to stage more initiatives to increase the commission’s reach. For instance, in April, with the Dutch and German commissions, they organised a conference that focused on the preservation of World Heritage sites in light of the increasing politicisation of site nominations. “A lot of countries lobby to have their site carry the Unesco label because it’s good for tourism. So they actually ignore advice from their experts,” D’Hoest explains. “We are trying to form something like a bloc against politicisation; that’s why international co-operation is really needed.”

The Flemish Unesco Commission is something of an anomaly in the global Unesco family, which now encompasses 199 national commissions. Flanders is one of the rare sub-state entities to have its own local Unesco commission. Aside from the Basque region, Flanders was the only region to have a direct co-operation agreement with Unesco when the commission was inaugurated in 2004.

Meeting at least three times a year, the commission is made up of five members with advisory votes and 12 members with full voting rights, each with their own area of expertise. Newly appointed by the Flemish government in 2010, these full members are mostly policy experts, high-level civil servants and academics.

D’Hoest is a crucial axis in this constellation. As the secretary-general, he functions as a liaison between the Paris-based Unesco headquarters and the Flemish government and local experts here. For instance, Unesco has a long-running programme on erosion problems in the West African country of Burkina Faso. Regularly, D’Hoest examines if there are any new Flemish experts on water he can direct to the project or if new research has been carried out at local universities that could be linked to it. “This way Flemish expertise is integrated into a Unesco project,” he says.

Since the government’s policy portfolio includes the four Unesco activity areas – education, science, culture and communication – the local commission is the first stop for Unesco in the orientation and development of its international programmes in Flanders. One of its tasks as a local commission was to introduce the Memory of the World programme in the region. This international Unesco initiative aims to facilitate preservation of and raise awareness about the world’s documentary heritage.

In May, the Flemish commission established a Memory of the World working group in which the National Library, local heritage institutions and research bodies all had a voice. This committee offers recommendations on inclusion of local elements in the Unesco Memory of the World Register like, for instance, the former archives of the University of Leuven. (They were accepted.)

And then of course, there are the World Heritage operations for which Unesco is best known. The Unesco stamp of approval recognises a site’s cultural or historical importance as being of international value. The commission’s role here, too, is to advise the government of Flanders on the merit of site proposals. Belgium currently has 11 World Heritage sites, with the early 20th-century Stoclet House in Brussels, designed by architect Joseph Hoffman, among the most recent additions, alongside the historic centre of Bruges and Flemish begijnhoven.

In addition to advising the government of Flanders on Unesco matters, the commission also works to spread the Unesco heritage and goals in the region through projects of its own. Last May, for instance, it organised a photo exhibition documenting the impact of climate change on World Heritage sites in Leuven. Satellites and World Heritage Sites, Partners to Understand Climate Change vividly documented the threat of climate change – shrinking glaciers, desertification and flooding – hovering over World Heritage sites around the world.

As part of that same awareness-raising mission, the commission is recruiting a youth representative to join as a member with an advisory vote. In addition to attending the Unesco Youth Forum in Paris this November, he or she will also be expected to develop initiatives to spread Unesco goals and heritage in Flanders and will liaise with the Flemish Youth Council – a first.

The commission also plays a substantial role in promoting and funding research, with several Unesco chairs at universities across Flanders focusing on themes like peace-building, monument maintenance and desertification. Its best-known research-funding effort is perhaps the Belgian L’Oréal-Unesco fellowships. (see sidebar).

While advances have been made in the last two years, much of what the commission does remains behind closed doors because it essentially functions as a liaison office and advisory body. “We feel that the public doesn’t know us at all and that they think that the work of Unesco is limited to World Heritage – that’s the idea that everybody has,” D’Hoest says.

Pointing out that most Flemings would probably agree with the intrinsic value of the commission’s work, he says: “I think the problem is not that they don’t accept what we do, but that they just don’t know what we do.”

A new and more intensive collaboration agreement with the non-profit Unesco Platform Vlaanderen, whose chief task is to promote Unesco at large in Flanders, should soon bring relief. The two organisations have agreed to work even more closely in the future and will soon join forces to make the commission’s work and the Unesco legacy in Flanders more visible. “That’s truly the goal for our commission now,” says D’Hoest, “to change the view of what we do and who we work with.”

http://unesco.flanders.be

Women in life sciences

Together with the French cosmetics powerhouse and other partner organisations, the Flemish commission awards Belgian L’Oréal-Unesco grants to young female researchers in life sciences every two years.

Leen Mathys was one of the three 2011 For Women in Science winners. The award, she says, was a heaven-sent gift. Her research examines the role of glycans, or sugar structures, in the entry of the HIV virus. Her budding research career had come to a screeching halt when she found out that her application for funding had been rejected; it looked like her research project would never see the light of day.

But someone from L’Oréal called. The Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (Scientific Research Foundation) had forwarded her file, and she had been selected to receive a $40,000 fellowship.

Mathys, 23 at the time, was both surprised and ecstatic. “It was a really prestigious award to get,” she says. “It was really encouraging to start a PhD that way.” Mathys should obtain her doctorate at KU Leuven in two years and plans to do postdoctoral research after that. “I want to stay in academia and hopefully become a professor.”