10/01/2025 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 10/02/2025 06:58
The Minister for Culture, Ernest Urtasun, and UNESCO's Director-General, Audrey Azoulay, at the closing ministerial plenary session of Mondiacult 2025 (Pool Moncloa)
Mondiacult 2025, UNESCO's World Conference on Cultural Policies and Sustainable Development, organised jointly with the Government of Spain through the Ministry of Culture, closed today.
The Minister for Culture, Ernest Urtasun, and UNESCO's Assistant Director-General for Culture, Ernesto Ottone, presented the conclusions of Mondiacult 2025 at a press conference, as set out in the Final Declaration, which was read out at the closing ministerial plenary of the Conference, an event attended by the Minister for Culture, Ernest Urtasun, and UNESCO's Director-General, Audrey Azoulay.
One of the main agreements reached by the Ministers for Culture at Mondiacult 2025 was to promote culture as a human right and to advance the promotion of culture as an independent Goal in its own right within the framework of the UN's post-2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development .
As the final Declaration states, between Mondiacult 2022 and 2025 "ongoing discussions have highlighted that culture is both an indispensable driver and an enabler of sustainable development, and must be included as an integral component and pillar of sustainable development. This message is supported by institutions, professionals, communities and civil society around the world. There is no future without culture".
During his speech at the closing ministerial plenary, the Minister for Culture, Ernest Urtasun, stressed that "the conclusions of Mondiacult 2025 will resonate at the upcoming major international events such as COP30 in Belém. We will bring the voice of culture to where the futures of humanity are decided, because there will be no just ecological transition, no lasting peace, no strong democracy without a cultural dimension to sustain them".
He added that this Conference "has been much more than a forum for dialogue: it has been a collective affirmation of principles. Because to defend culture today is to choose cooperation when others opt for withdrawal; it is to embrace diversity in the face of those who seek to standardise thinking; it is, in short, to renew the founding spirit of the international community, which recognised culture as a universal right and an indispensable condition for peace".
Mondiacult 2025 has turned Barcelona into a cultural capital with more than 160 ministerial delegations from all over the world, a hundred thematic sessions and parallel events. More than 2,500 people took part over three days, including ministers for culture and government delegations from all over the world, as well as cultural professionals, artists, academics, researchers and representatives of civil society.
All the sessions revolved around the thematic axes of Mondiacult 2025: cultural rights, culture in the digital era, the integration of culture in education, the economy of culture, the cultural dimensions of climate change and the defence of heritage in crisis and emergency situations, and two topical issues incorporated into the debate at the request of Spain and of great interest to the culture sector, AI and the culture of peace.
In this edition, and at the request of the Ministry of Culture, Mondiacult 2025 opened for the first time to civil society with the holding of the citizens' forum Civic Agora, to the autonomous communities, and to young people with Mondiayouth, a conference made up of young people from all over the world.
The declaration drawn up in Mondiayouth, a space developed in parallel to the plenary sessions during the three days of Mondiacult 2025, with almost 50 young people from more than 40 countries from all over the world, was also read out during the closing ministerial plenary.
In this declaration they affirmed that "culture is one of the greatest pillars of humanity", and that despite the many challenges and threats, "culture offers extraordinary potential", adding that "young people build cultural initiatives that promote intercultural dialogue and civic participation, which facilitate cultural innovation, integrating indigenous knowledge and traditional practices".
They also called for "harnessing emerging technologies to the service of culture and not to its detriment", calling for public institutions to "cooperate to regulate the use of emerging technologies and AI to safeguard the intellectual property of cultural and artistic workers".
The safeguarding of cultural rights, the guarantee of sustainable cultural production and mediation were other proclamations of the young people in their declaration. They also advocated "rethinking education to empower youth as cultural connectors".
They ended their statement by describing Mondiayouth as a "global commitment of public managers to recognise youth as political actors", calling for a second Mondiayouth in the next edition of Mondiacult: "Let us express our opinions in the same spaces as you".
Agora Cívica, the citizens' forum jointly promoted by Barcelona City Council, the Generalitat de Catalunya, Barcelona Provincial Council and the Ministry of Culture in the framework of Mondiacult 2025, also closes today after having brought together more than 8,200 participants in more than 120 activities.
At the closing ceremony of Mondiacult, the conclusions of Agora Cívica were also presented. Among them, the need for a culture-focused goal in the global sustainable development agenda for the 2030 Agenda was also highlighted. The conclusions of this citizens' forum also call for cultural rights to not just be a declaration, but to be translated into practical and concrete measures.
Mondiacult 2025 featured a cultural programme that started with artistic interventions by Frederic Amat, Maria Arnal, Tarta Relena and Miguel Poveda with Yerbabuena during the opening ceremony.
On Tuesday 30 September, at Palau de la Música, a concert for peace and dialogue by the conductor Jordi Savall took place, in which he presented a diverse repertoire in terms of origin and period, accompanied by musicians from all over the world.
Throughout the three days of the Conference, the CCIB also hosted exhibitions of different manifestations of Spanish intangible heritage, with performances of 'jotas' from different Spanish regions, 'tamborradas' and 'castells'.
Non official translation