WHUK’s President Chris Blandford recently attended the launch of Ireland’s World Heritage Strategy. Chris was one of the strategy’s co-authors. Here is Chris’ speech from the launch:
“Good evening, everyone. I am honoured to have been an adviser to Ireland’s Government in bringing to fruition their National World Heritage Strategy.
I have explored the landscapes and richness of Ireland’s diverse heritage for many years. One occasion has always stuck in my memory…in 1966, greeted by a simple cast iron Board of Public Works sign half hidden in the hedgerow and after a glass of the black stuff with the caretaker I visited the Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth monuments. I crawled into the dark chambers on my own with only a candle to light the way…a very moving, spiritual and inspirational experience.
Of course, the notion of World Heritage had not yet emerged through the UNESCO 1972 Convention and it wasn’t until the 90s that the site was inscribed as Bru na Boinne onto the WH List.
Little did I know then that nearly 60 years later I would be asked to look at these and other places as the starting point for the further development of World Heritage in Ireland!!
It has been a great privilege to work closely with my fellow advisors and team members – Professor Gabriel Cooney and Mona O’Rourke. We are all passionate about the importance and protection of World Heritage. We therefore relished the challenge to create a future framework to guide the future development of World Heritage in Ireland over the next 10 years. But this project was actually the result of much collaboration with many others who enthusiastically offered their views and help. Despite Covid, a first draft of the Strategy was delivered in 2021. Michael MacDonagh’s World Heritage team brilliantly refined the Strategy into the format needed by Government. It was truly a team effort and all who contributed can take credit for its success. A long but necessary journey to ensure many complex issues could be distilled into a robust, politically acceptable, and enduring framework for the future
From 2022 onwards and in parallel with work on the strategy refinement, the immediate challenges were to create a dedicated and resourced World Heritage Unit, increasing its capacity and knowledge to ensure the strategy could be successfully monitored nationally and implemented locally.
As we celebrate the completion of the Strategy today, we can see that so much has now been achieved in the last 4 years. The significance of World Heritage for Ireland has been reignited and the Strategy is guiding significant progress and actions on many fronts.
You may ask “are we just catching up with other countries who have continued to create more World Heritage Sites“? Not so! I know from my work across Europe that Ireland’s recent journey is very unusual and the top-down approach of your National World Heritage Strategy is absent in nearly all other countries. Your Strategy, already applauded by UNESCO in Paris earlier this year, sets a hugely useful and exemplary precedent of good practice that other countries need to follow!
One last word…I am only too aware that World Heritage matters everywhere can often be complex, sensitive, bureaucratic, political, marginal, and misunderstood. The World Heritage Committee may also have perhaps become a little over complicated and politicized. But 50 years on, the principles on which the World Heritage Convention rests and the tests that it requires to ensure the protection of all World Heritage Outstanding Universal Values remains a vital and common denominator and a robust foundation for all existing and new World Heritage Sites here in Ireland and elsewhere.
The World Heritage values that need to be protected and passed to our children and grandchildren and beyond, lie at the heart of your Strategy. In our troubled and war-torn world, we need to remember that all of our World Heritage assets should be ambassadors of peace as UNESCO so wisely envisaged 80 years ago. Your Strategy commits to this and I am sure that with its enthusiasm for World Heritage, Ireland will want to continue to contribute to this.
Thank you for listening.”
Chris Blandford OBE FLI November 2025
L-R: Emer Connolly (Director of National Monuments Service or NMS), Mona O’Rourke (ICOMOS Ireland/ Brú na Bóinne Community Heritage Facilitator, strategy co-author), Prof. Gabriel Cooney (University College Dublin and strategy co-author), Michael MacDonagh (Chief Archaeologist, NMS), Chris Blandford, John Knightley (World Heritage Focal Point NMS), Ross Waters (Deputy World Heritage Focal Point NMS), and Edel Dwyer (Head of National Monuments & Visitor Services, Office of Public Works).