Safeguarding World Heritage Sites
The 1972 Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage (The World Heritage Convention) sets a number of basic documentation standards which are applicable to most heritage sites throughout the world. A GIS has a valuable application to each of the four principal procedures involved in preparing management plans for cultural heritage sites.
These procedures are:
- Research: historical and physical site documentation
- Analysis: assessment of physical condition, cultural significance and the social and administrative context
- Response: preparing conservation and management strategies
- Implementation: carrying out, monitoring and evaluating management policies
By using a GIS, heritage managers can:
- generate permanent records of heritage sites
- understand how cultural heritage relates spatially to its surrounding natural and human environment
- communicate knowledge and network databases
- test proposed development models and conservation strategies
- facilitate monitoring and management of sites
