G8 Culture Summit: Europe must do more to preserve heritage, says Vassiliou
The challenge of making Europe's cultural heritage more accessible and ensuring a thriving creative economy will be among the issues addressed by Androulla Vassiliou at the Cultural Summit in Avignon, France, on 18 November.
The event, which is being organised as part of France's Presidency of the G8-G20 group of world economic powers, will be attended by President Nicolas Sarkozy, French Minister of Culture and Communication Frédéric Mitterrand and representatives of the G8-G20 countries.
Commissioner Vassiliou will highlight recommendations by the Commission's expert group on digitisation (Comité des Sages) for Europe's digital library Europeana to become the main portal for online access to cultural heritage and to encourage public-private partnerships to drive digitisation and job creation (IP/11/17). "Preservation of cultural heritage for future generations should be an imperative for every society," said Commissioner Vassiliou before the event. Later this month, the Commission will adopt 'Creative Europe', its new programme in support of the audiovisual industry and culture. The Commission is set to propose a 20% increase in funding for the cinema industry in 2014-2020, to around €900 million from €755 million now. The Cultural Summit is taking place in parallel with the Forum D'Avignon, an annual meeting dedicated to exchanges between stakeholders from the worlds of culture, the creative industries, the economy and the media.
