The Festival International de Géographie (FIG) was founded in 1990 in Saint-Dié-des-Vosges, France. This year‘s theme “landscape/paysage” offered a rich and diverse programme. It included a panel on World Heritage cultural landscapes on 3 October 2026 with former UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova and former Director of the World Heritage Centre and OWH member Mechtild Rössler, moderated by geographer and urbanist Bernard Debarbieux (University of Geneva).
The panel discussed the evolution of cultural landscapes as a category of sites recognized in 1992 under the 1972 World Heritage Convention. The panelists highlighted the role of landscape conservation for sustainable development and Agenda 2023, addressing climate change and the communities caring for the land including transboundary pastoral sites. The exchange with the full room at the Hotel de Ville of Saint Die was fascinating, as it covered the notion of landscape in different cultural contexts, the understanding of conservation of living cultural landscapes such as the Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras and how the recognition of associative cultural landscapes changed the management by Indigenous Peoples at sites such as Tongrariro National Park (New Zealand) and Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park (Australia).
Former UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova and former Director of the World Heritage Centre and OWH member Mechtild Rössler, moderated by geographer and urbanist Bernard Debarbieux (University of Geneva) at the panel on World Heritage cultural landscapes, Festival de Geographie, St. Die.
