East Asian region is developed a rich of variety in the intangible heritage manifests, from oral traditions, performing arts, customs, and rituals to festivals, clothing, crafts, and food throughout the centuries. However, as with other counties in the Asia-Pacific region, which is a treasure house of ICH, traditional cultural heritage of East Asia was in a crisis of extinction due to shifts in industrial structures and the population outflow of younger generations to urban areas. In response, the Republic of Korea and Japan introduced the concept of intangible cultural heritage in policies related to safeguarding cultural heritage more than fifty years ago. Mongolia, with the support of its respective government, followed suit by establishing an institutional foundation for national ICH inventory making and ICH safeguarding after ratifying the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003). Moreover, in relation to ICH safeguarding activities, UNESCO Category 2 Centres, which support ICH safeguarding activities, have been simulataneously going through the establishment process in the Republic of Korea, China, and Japan. As a well-intentioned objective for the future activities, the three centres are making efforts to build a cooperative mechanism among themselves. Another effort made in the region is the establishment of the ICH safeguarding system in Mongolia. The government of Mongolia has drawn up a national ICH inventory and identified bearers as well. The countries in East Asia have been very active in safeguarding, and their participation at regional and international levels. Therefore, countries in the region need to build trust and collaborative relationships while safeguarding ICH at national, regional, and international levels.\n\n- Ratified the ICH Convention in 2005; conducted survey in 2009 and updated in 2016.\n- As of March 2018, has 7 ICH elements on the RL, 7 elements on the USL, and 1 accredited NGO.

ICH Courier is the quarterly magazine on ICH in the Asia-Pacific region issued by ICHCAP since 2009. Every issue has its own theme under the title of the Windows to ICH, and the theme of the Vol 12 is 'ICH AND MAKEUP'.

This report includes the presentation papers of the participants and a summary of the discussions that took place at the meeting. The general discussion topics for the three sections are Implementation of 2003 Convention and International Cooperation; Strengthening Collaborative Network through ICH Information Sharing; and Building Information Systems—Identification, Documentation, and Archives. The individual papers go into detail about building online systems for sharing ICH information, protecting intellectual property, maintaining and strengthening regional and sub-regional cooperation, and other related subjects.

ICH Courier is the quarterly magazine on ICH in the Asia-Pacific region issued by ICHCAP since 2009. Every issue has its own theme under the title of the Windows to ICH, and the theme of the Vol 17 is 'TRADITIONAL CHILDREN’S GAMES.'

The Booklet presents materials related to the National Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) of the Kyrgyz Republic. Publication introduces the intangible cultural heritage and directed at raising awareness about the ICH elements among the wider public, concerned specialists, national and international organizations working in the field of the intangible cultural heritage.

On 13 September 2018, experts of the Asia-Pacific region gathered to discuss maritime topics. Organized and hosted by ICHCAP and the National Research Institute of Maritime Cultural Heritage, the symposium, in two sessions, allowed an opportunity to discuss issues related to traditional shipbuilding and navigation skills as well as traditional maritime knowledge in contemporary life.\n\nThis report is composed of seven presentation papers from seven countries, namely China, ROK, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, PNG, and Madagascar, regarding on transmission of traditional ship making and navigation skills.\n

Under UNESCO Living Human Treasures Program, the project ‘Introducing UNESCO Living Human Treasures System in Mongolia’ has been successfully implemented in order to realize efforts in safeguarding intangible cultural heritage in Mongolia.\nThe main objective of this project aims to introduce and implement UNESCO Living Human Treasures System in Mongolia and so protect, maintain and encourage intangible cultural heritage and bearers in Mongolia within implementation efforts of the 2003 Convention.\n\nThe following activities have been defined and planned to implement within the project implementation work:\n\n1. Review and analyze previous research study materials, data information and field survey findings on intangible cultural heritage and its bearers in Mongolia, and make general overviews upon current situations of intangible cultural heritage\n2. Develop recommendations on designing a relevant legal framework for implementing UNESCO Living Human Treasures program in Mongolia and submit them to responsible governmental institutions for further approval and actions\n3. Organize exchange tours of expert teams implementing the project in South Korea and Mongolia and so share viewpoints and experiences in safeguarding and maintaining intangible cultural heritage in reality\n4. Appoint and send field research teams to some areas of Mongolia, namely some Western and Mongolian regional aimags in order to identify, survey, determine and document locations and distributions of certain bearers of intangible cultural heritage\n5. Develop draft proposals of ‘List of types and forms of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Mongolia’, ‘The List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding’, ‘The Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Mongolia’ and submit them to MECS\n6. Design an initial draft of reference manuals of intangible cultural heritage in Mongolia based on results and findings of all above reviews and research analysis. During the joint seminar meetings held on 12-13 December, 2008 the Mongolian and Korean expert teams withdrew general feedback upon ongoing implementation processes of the project and shared comments on achievements of project goals and objectives, in addition to defining some specific areas of further activities. It definitely contributed considerable inputs in efforts introducing ‘Living Human Treasures’ Program and thus safeguarding intangible cultural heritage in Mongolia

Present booklet was developed by experts of Uzbekistan in line with provision of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003) and the National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage that had been approved by the Republican Centre for Folk Art under the Ministry of Culture and Sports of the Republic of Uzbekistan. The publication is the output of the joint cooperation project between Uzbekistan and ICHCAP under the title of “2011-2014 Facilitating ICH Inventory Making and Using Online Tools for ICH Safeguarding in the Central Asian Region”.

Present Promotional book was developed by experts of Uzbekistan in line with provision of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003). The Promotional book is the output of the joint cooperation project between National Commission of the Republic of Uzbekistan for UNESCO and ICHCAP under the title of “Publishing an ICH Promotional Book in Uzbekistan”.

2019 World Forum for Intangible Cultural Heritage

This book is a collection of the eight selected NGOs’ ICH safeguarding activities in accordance with achieving Sustainable Development Goals, especially Goal 4: Quality Education. With the inclusion of NGOs from Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Indonesia, Mongolia, and the Philippines, this book provides an opportunity to look into the current ICH safeguarding status and environment of the seven countries and to seek measures to overcome the many different challenges involved with ICH safeguarding.

Based on the ICHCAP Field Survey on Intangible Cultural Heritage Safeguarding Efforts in some East and Central Asian countries from 2009 to 2012, this summary provides a brief overview on the ICH situation in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan . The summary focuses mainly on ICH safeguarding systems, safeguarding policies, and ICH inventories as well as on pending issues and the urgent safeguarding needs of these countries. Moreover, information on the main entities in charge of ICH safeguarding and opinions of each country on the issue of community involvement are provided. To give a quick overview these countries’ participation in ICH safeguarding at the international level, some additional information related to UNESCO is specified as well. This survey report offers a large sample of the diverse ICH situations in East Asian and Central Asian countries. Although each country has a different background on issue of intangible heritage, depending on its cultural, economic, and socio-political situation, the countries participating in the survey share a commonality: They are post-communist countries that were once under the Soviet system. Moreover, they share a traditional culture shaped by nomadic pastoralism that offers a variety of cultural similarities. For instance, they keep an ancient and rich tradition of epic singing, and they are highly concerned about this oral heritage as it is on the brink of disappearance. In this sense, they have much to exchange and share in regards to safeguarding ICH. The countries participating in the survey are concerned with the threats against their ICH, but most of these nations are in the early process of defining ICH and establishing independent national ICH lists. At the same time, each country expresses a high degree of motivation and encouragement for safeguarding ICH, sharing experiences, and participating in international cooperation programmes. Apart from the main subject, a brief glimpse is taken on the situation of intellectual property in ICH safeguarding in each country. Compared to the Southwest Asian countries that participated in the field survey, the East Asian and Central Asian countries provided little information on intellectual property issues, so it is recommended that ICHCAP undertake the Field Survey on Intellectual Property Issues in the Process of ICH Information Building and Information Sharing in some countries to see their status on this subject.\n\n- Ratified the ICH Convention in 2008; survey conducted in 2009 and updated in 2014.\n- As of March 2018, has 6 ICH elements on the RL, 1 element as GSP, and no accredited NGOs.