Brussels, 7 November 2017/ ACP: On 9 and 10 November 2017, the Secretariat of the ACP Group of States will organise the fourth meeting of ACP Ministers of Culture on the topic of “Making culture an impact investment in achieving 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development” in Brussels. The Ministers’ conference will be preceded by the meeting of ACP Senior Officials in charge of Culture on 7 and 8 November.

The ACP Ministers meeting follows the one organised in October 2012, which led to the adoption of the 2012 Brussels resolution, which has been the milestone of the cultural action of the ACP Secretariat over the last 5 years, notably through the implementation of the ACPCultures+ Programme.

In commenting the meeting of ACP Ministers of Culture, Mr. Patrick Gomes, Secretary-General of the ACP Group of States declared that “the promotion of inter-cultural dialogue and the creation of a shared conscience represent an essential tool for collaboration, integration, solidarity, growth and sustainable development in ACP countries”.

The meeting will focus on 4 main areas: culture as an engine for economic growth and employment, culture in intra-ACP cooperation and ACP-EU relations post 2020 and how to achieve a better integration of culture in all strategies and policies to have a leveraging effect on sustainable development, global initiatives for women and young people as entrepreneurs in ACP cultural cooperation programmes.

The fourth ACP ministerial meeting on culture seeks to confirm the ACP leadership in implementing cultural programmes: the aim is to draw up a common document on the topic of culture as an instrument of cooperation, reinforcement of the commitment of the ACP community to invest on culture, and consider culture as a key driver for the economic and human development of ACP countries, while contributing to the promotion of the cultural diversity.

Finally, the meeting will be the occasion to present the priorities of the new ACP-EU programme of support to the ACP cultural industries, which will be launched in 2018. This programme, endowed with an amount of 40 million euros, will be financed by the European Union and implemented by the ACP Secretariat.

For more information, visit the ACP Cultures+ website

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