Hon. Minister opens 2nd AU Workshop on the review of the Cultural and Creative Industries Action Plan
16 April 2019
The Honourable Minister of Sports, Culture and Youth Affairs Harries Bulunga today officially opened the second workshop for the review of the African Union (AU) Action Plan on Cultural and Creative Industries.
The workshop, which is hosted by Eswatini in conjunction with the AU Cultural Unit, is held at Bethel Court in Matsapha and will run until Thursday, 18 April. Speaking at the opening ceremony earlier today, the Honourable Minister thanked the AU for choosing Eswatini as hosts of the review workshop.
“This review therefore becomes hugely important for our country because it will help us align our efforts with those of the rest of the continent in terms of developing the cultural and creative industries in order to maximise all benefits we can extract from them particularly by offering our people opportunities to living better and fulfilling lives,” Bulunga said.
The Honourable Minister further stressed the importance of the review not just for Eswatini but for the rest of the African continent.
“This review will map out the current status of the creative economy sector in each of the AU members states. This information will enable countries and regions to get updated information on the value chain of the sector and promote intra-African trade in line with the protocol of the African Continental Free Trade Area recently adopted by the AU assembly.
The workshop is attended by some of the brightest minds in the African cultural and creative industries with experts coming from countries including Mozambique, Tanzania, Nigeria, Zimbabwe and South Africa. Also in attendance during the opening ceremony were the Director of Arts and Culture in the Ministry Phinda Nkosi and Eswatini National Council of Arts and Culture (ENCAC) CEO Stanley Dlamini.