The Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine was solemnly handed over the original UNESCO certificate on the inclusion of the element “Culture of making Ukrainian borscht” in the List of intangible cultural heritage in need of urgent protection. The handover of the document took place yesterday, December 6, during the IV meeting of the Bureau of the National Commission of Ukraine for UNESCO.
“Among numerous difficult work issues, there are also such pleasant moments. We are happy about this achievement of Ukraine on the world stage and are actively working on new ones,” said Kateryna Chuyeva, a member of the National Commission for UNESCO and Deputy Minister of Culture and Information Policy.
In addition to the heads of sectors of the National Commission, the Bureau’s meeting was attended by Chiara Bardesky, the public relations coordinator of the UNESCO Bureau in Ukraine, representatives of the expert environment, artist on behalf of UNESCO Herman Makarenko.
During the meeting, a number of work issues were considered, in particular, the results of the work of the National Commission during 2022, interaction with UNESCO, work plans for the next year, as well as countering russian aggression.
The participants also discussed preparations of the Ukrainian side’s participation in the 42nd session of the UNESCO General Conference (November 2023), candidacy of Ukraine to the UNESCO Executive Board for the period 2025-2029, prospects for inclusion objects in the List of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in an extraordinary order of objects which are on the UNESCO Tentative list.
It should be reminded that previously Ukrainian borscht was included in the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of UNESCO in Need of Urgent Protection.
The corresponding decision was made on July 1 at the 5th extraordinary meeting of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage.
“Victory in the war for borscht is ours! The battle for borscht was started even before the war. And no matter how much Masha Zakharova said that “cookery books were banned, and the recipe of the dish was kept secret and it was forbidden to cook” and in general our borscht is a “manifestation of extremism and Nazism”, this “manifestation of extremism” is now officially Ukrainian, and officially under protection of UNESCO,” wrote Oleksandr Tkachenko, the Minister of Culture and Information Policy, on Facebook at that time.
