International Centre on Space Technologies for Natural and Cultural Heritage under the auspices of UNESCO officially opened by Prof. Gretchen Kalonji, Assistant Director General of Natural Sciences UNESCO jointly with Prof. Ding Zhongli, Vice President of Chinese Academy of Sciences in presence of officials from various Ministries with Government of China and international experts. 

The newly created International Centre is located at the premises Centre for Earth Observation and Digital Earth (CEODE). This International Centre on Space Technologies for Natural and Cultural Heritage (HIST) will be assisting UNESCO with the use of space technologies in monitoring, documentation and conservation of the famous World Heritage sites (both natural and Cultural).

Our heritage is in danger by human activities, climate change, natural disasters, etc. the new centre will play a key role in using space technologies for monitoring the changes.  Without question space technologies are an extremely valuable tool to assist in the management of heritage sites. Satellites have been flying over the earth for the last 40 years continuously taken images. Therefore we do have 40 years of a tremendous digital archive of satellite images. This information is extremely valuable in order to understand how the threats to our cultural and natural heritage are evolving and how to stop these threats on-time before it is too late.

Prof. Gretchen Kalonji quoted that “the outstanding expertise of CEODE, put at the service of us at UNESCO is a tremendous scientific and technological contribution for UNESCO and we largely appreciate the fruitful partnership that UNESCO has with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, today being significantly strengthened through the opening of a dedicated space technology center”.