As part of the process of restitution of cultural property in Benin, the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and the Arts has launched the implementation of the ad hoc training program. This is the Capacity Building Program for cultural mediation specialists, the first part of which dedicated to the training of tourist guides, launched on Monday, September 13, was closed on Friday, September 17, 2021, in Abomey. The closing ceremony, which marks the official launch of the capacity building sessions for heritage professionals, was chaired by the Minister of Tourism, Culture and the Arts, Babalola Jean-Michel H. Abimbola. It was in the presence of the Ambassador of France to Benin, representatives of the ministers of foreign affairs and cooperation,
In his introductory words, the Director of the School of African Heritage (EPA), an international reference center selected to provide training, underlined that this first part of the ad hoc training program which will take place respectively in Abomey, Ouidah and Porto-Novo, concerns about sixty participants made up of 10 curators, twenty (20) guides and (22) students at the end of training from INMAAC and EPA. Franck Ogou reassured the authorities present that the capacities of beneficiaries have been truly strengthened, with regard to the quality of the group of trainers committed to the task and the relevance of the modules designed and developed in an educational approach.
The Ambassador of France to Benin, Marc VIZY, enumerated the programs that his country is developing within the framework of museum and heritage cooperation between Benin and France, and which goes beyond the simple return of the 26 works. promised by France. And it is in this logical sequence that his institution provides financial support for the implementation of the program through the Solidarity Fund for Innovative Projects (FSPI). He praised Benin’s approach and then reiterated the Embassy’s support for strengthening this cooperation between the two countries.
After recalling the massive investments made by the Government of Benin in favor of the rehabilitation of the museum and heritage fabric of the country and the creation of new museum infrastructures of international standards, Minister Babalola Jean-Michel H. Abimbola, specified the importance this series of capacity building sessions for the benefit of sixty (60) professionals, and to which is added the training of fifty-four (54) guides within the framework of a Convention signed with the World Tourism Organization, with the support of the World Bank.
According to his words, the efforts made by the Government to update the legal and regulatory environment of the culture sector in general and heritage in particular, must be supported by raising the level of technical preparation of human resources for the management of works in reserve, in the workshop and on display and the professionalization of the professions of cultural mediator in general and of guides to museums and tourist sites in particular. And it is here that lies all the interest given to this program of capacity building of heritage staff and which testifies according to the authority,
Better, he will say, this series of sessions is another manifestation of the dynamic of strengthening ties of museum and heritage cooperation with France, marked by the signing since 2019 of the Joint Work Program with a view to restitution. twenty-six (26) works from the royal treasury of Abomey kept by the Quai-Branly museum.
Finally, he invited the beneficiaries to take the opportunity of these sessions to consolidate their knowledge in order to contribute better than in the past, to a better promotion of Destination Benin.
Source: Government of the Republic of Benin