Mr Hassoum Ceesay, director of Heritage at the National Centre for Arts and Culture (NCAC) has said that heritage is a broad term that encompasses material and immaterial aspects of peoples’ identity cherished by succeeding generations. Heritage according to him can be natural and cultural.

Mr Ceesay, made these observations whilst presenting a paper on “Material cultural Heritage, Research, Conservation, Interpretation and Development.” He added that heritage is divided into  material also known as tangibles, which include things that could be seen or felt such as historical sites, monuments among others.

Whilst immaterial heritage otherwise called intangible heritage includes things that could not be seen such as music, folktales etc.

Mr Ceesay described UNESCO’s World Heritage Sites such as the James Island and Stone Circles as universally valued in the history of humankind and culture. The inscription of these sites on the list of world heritage is indeed the  highest honour to the country’s historical sites.

He used the opportunity to call on the Department of State for Tourism and Culture to implore on the Government of The Gambia to officially gazette all cultural and heritage related sites in which the National Centre for Arts and Culture (NCAC) could play a vital role in.

According to Mr Ceesay, material and cultural heritage is geard towards  awareness building, promoting tourism, job  creation among others. He expressed the need for conservation of heritage and other related cultural sites to prevent distruction and  added that there is a need to conserve material heritage in order to  kept them for posterity.

For his part, Dr Omar Touray a board member of the National Centre for Arts and Culture (NCAC), presented a paper on the need to bring culture in the foundation of development in The Gambia considering the irreplaceable potentials of culture as a resource and it’s important role as an environment where both tradition and change are closely inter-related and interdependent. Dr Touray noted that beyond national policy, legislative and regulatory frameworks, government should ensure the contribution to the elaboration of such frameworks at the sub-regional level and beyond.

He spoke at lenght on the potentials of culture as a resource. According to him, development is part of people’s culture and added that culture is a grantor of peace and security in Gambian society.