Mongols have practiced pastoral nomadism for centuries within the vast steppe that stretches throughout Central Asia, which has led to the creation of a nomadic civilization, a distinct civilization accepted worldwide. Within the context of this residing landscape, the main features of spirituality, and oral and intangible cultures practiced by Mongols have been crafted and determined.

The National Institute of Folk & Traditional Heritage, popularly known as Lok Virsa, was established by the government of Pakistan in 1974 with a mandate to collect, document, preserve, and disseminate Pakistan’s tangible and intangible cultural heritage.

Closely linked to human dignity and identity, cultural heritage embodies resources that enable the cultural identification and development of individuals and communities, through which they express their humanity, give meaning to their existence, build their worldviews, and articulate their encounters with the external forces affecting their lives.

In the context of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, a wide field of NGOs is active in between governments and communities to translate concepts, facilitate and support safeguarding programs, advocate bearers’ perspectives and interests, etc. In doing so, they often turn out to be key actors for successful heritage processes engaging communities.

Folkland, International Centre for Folklore and Culture is a nonprofit NGO devoted to promoting folklore and culture. Headquartered in Kerala in south-western India, Folkland has three main centers and several chapters in India and associations with other organizations abroad through MOUs and collab-orative partnerships. Folkland has been affiliated with the UNESCO ICH sector since 2010. Folkland envisions a society that respects cultural heritage by conserving arts and cultural traditions and transmitting them to future generations. As such, Folkland is proudly dedicated to promoting Indian culture and values with a focus on intangible cultural heritage. The center provides access to knowledge and information about intangible cultural heritage and is known for promoting indigenous culture that inspires audiences to explore the cultural and artistic heritage of Kerala. The main domains covered by Folkland are performing arts; oral traditions and expressions; social practices, rituals, and festivals; and traditional crafts. Folkland documents oral traditions and practices and extends training to younger genera-tions to revitalize old and near-extinct traditional art forms. One ICH element of particular interest to Folkland is tolpavakoothu (shadow puppetry).

The geography of Korea is ideal for growing lacquer trees. Optimal climate, topography, and soil conditions can be found across the country, and the lacquer produced is of the highest quality. This led to lacquerware crafts being highly valued in Korea over the years, and a uniquely Korean culture of lacquerware being developed.

The similar actions in fairytales, epics, and dastan of Altaians, Tatars, Bashkirs, Kazakhs, Karakalpaks, and other Turkic-speaking people, shows that the Uzbek dastan “Alpamysh,” as a creation of Turkic oral folk art, has a long history. In other nations, it is called “Alpamys,” “Alpamiros Botir,” “Alyp-manash,” “Alpamsha,” “Alpamysh,” and “Barchin Hiluv.”

Thundukuna is a special mat woven from reeds indigenous to the marshlands of Maldives. The reed is locally known as hau. Mat weaving from hau dates back some two hundred years, and this long history is mostly associated with the southernmost atolls.

The punnuk is a tugging ritual of the village folk from three communities in Hungduan, Ifugao in Northern Luzon, Philippines. It is performed at the confluence of Hapao River and a tributary as the final ritual after the rice harvest. Its consummation brings to a close an agricultural cycle and signals the beginning of a new one. \n\nThe punnuk is a ritual of pomp and revelry. Garbed in their predominantly red-col-ored attire of the Tuwali ethno-linguistic subgroup, the participants negotiate the terraced fields in a single file amidst lush greens under the blue skies. The tempo builds up as the participants reach the riverbank, each group positioned opposite the other. The excitement is sustained through the final tugging match, and the sinewy brawn of the participants is highlighted by the river’s rushing water.

In many cultures, there is a concept of expected gendered roles where people perform certain functions, parts, or kinds of a cultural or social activity according to their gender. Men are expected to be strong and masculine, and employ the roles which are more related to hard labor, leadership, and literacy. Women, traditionally, assume feminine and maternal characteristics and roles in supporting men in their social events. Although these notions of gender qualities and roles differ from culture to culture, it is often found that the traditional customs which dictate who can and cannot participate in specific parts of the culture are often bounded by gender stereotypes and taboos.

The Asia-Pacific region can be called a treasure house of ICH because of its diverse heritage and rich cultural environment. However, much of the ICH in the region is facing the possibility of disappearance because the value of ICH isn’t fully understood and there is a shortage of institutional and administrative support. In particular, developing or underdeveloped countries in the region are experiencing difficulties in effectively safeguarding ICH in the context of maintaining sociocultural traditions and promoting sustainable development because globalisation, urbanisation, and modernisation stand as obstacles.Recognising the shortcomings in ICH safeguarding, ICHCAP, a UNESCO Category 2 Centre, has recently been established based on the approval of UNESCO General Conference in 2009 and the agreement between UNESCO and the government of the Republic of Korea. The main roles and functions of the Centre focus on information and networking in the ICH safeguarding field. ICHCAP has contributed to ICH safeguarding and has learned a lot from the activities the Centre has conducted and participated in over the past four years.In this paper, I will introduce the main roles, functions, and collaborative works of ICHCAP in relation to ICH safeguarding in the Asia-Pacific region. I am hoping that the information provided here will also contribute to developing useful methods and cooperative measures in the ICH field among Asia-Pacific Member States and ICHCAP.

"Culture and Development \nCulture is the source of our identity, continuity, and creativity. Therefore, culture is important in its own right. Besides this intrinsic value, culture has social and economic values. Recently, there has been growing attention to the economic contribution of culture to development mainly through cultural and creative industries, including cultural tourism. In October 2010, UN General Assembly adopted a resolution 65/166, which emphasises the important contribution of culture to sustainable development and the achievement of national development objectives and internationally agreed development goals, including Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).\nThis resolution invites all Member States, intergovernmental organisations, and UN agencies to ensure a more visible and effective integration and mainstreaming of culture in development policies and strategies. \nICH Convention and Information/Data \nThe UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH Convention) provides important principles and guidelines for cultural policy for ICH safeguarding. The most important goal of the ICH Convention is to ensure the safeguarding of ICH in need of urgent safeguarding. As the number of State Parties increases and the reach of the ICH Convention expands, the ICH Convention is expected to allow us to identify vulnerability and risks facing ICH elements in different parts of the world. It will then enable us to manage and mitigate risks of ICH elements being completely lost by drawing attention of national authorities and the international community base on knowledge base created by the ICH Convention. Different kinds of information and data will be generated by implementing the ICH Convention According to Article 12.1 of the ICH Convention, each State Party shall draw up, in a manner geared to its own situation, one or more inventories of ICH present in its territory and ensure that the inventory is updated. ICH inventories "