National policy on culture and heritage
Kenya in the last two years has been reviewing the national policy on culture and heritage. The purpose of the review has been to align it to the constitution and to the UNESCO Conventions that Kenya has ratified. The review process has engaged civil society, cultural organizations, experts and county governments. Kenya now has a final reviewed draft national culture policy. The reviewed policy outlines measures and strategies for protection and promotion of culture. The reviewed draft policy has also included emerging cultural issues such as promotion of creative industries.Further the reviewed cultural policy document provides guidelines to county governments for consideration in development of local county policies.The revised draft has factored the sustainable development goals. The implementation strategy under the revised policy requires that national and county governments ensuremulti stakeholder engagements in the planning and implementation of cultural development programmes and activities. The strategies for promotion of cultural expressions are in tandem with the principles of the 2005 UNESCO convention.
The main feature of the reviewed policy on culture is proposal to establish institutional frameworks for implementaion for example the establishemnt of a national culture council and and endowment fund for culture. The policy has also prioritized action programmes and allocated disntict yet complementary roles to national government and to county governments.
Regarding the implementation strategy the policy calls for a coordinated mechanism through engagement of the following;
- National government Ministry, Departments, and Agencies responsible for culture and intellectual property rights.
- County government departments and agencies responsible for culture
- Communities and cultural practitioners
- Private sector
- Civil Society
The Implementation matrix has identified priority programmes by both national governemnt and county governments and has further identified actors that include civil society for engagement in the implementation of the policy.
The reviwed policy has factored a monitoring and evaluation mecahnism and provided poosibe indicators to measure implementaion status and to guide follow ups.
Mainstreaming of culture in development
- A coordinated guide on cultural development at national and county levels
-Enhanced collaboration mechanisms between the national and county governments in cultural development matters.
-Enhanced participation of citizens in cultural governance
- Promotion of national cultural expressions
- Increased partnerships and collaborations
- Increased Cultural development programmes and activities
Implementation of the mesaure is through the regular government budgetary allocations to national and county governments.