Kingston, 12 November 2019 – The Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, the Honourable Olivia Grange, has been elected a Vice-President of the 40th Session of the UNESCO General Conference which is underway in Paris, France.

The General Conference, which happens every two years, brings together the 193 members of UNESCO to decide on the policies and work of the organisation.

Minister Grange was elected Vice-President in her absence. She will leave Jamaica on Wednesday (tomorrow) to participate in the General Conference as well as the meeting of the powerful UNESCO Executive Board.

The 58-member Executive Board is responsible for the overall management of UNESCO. Jamaica is serving the Board on a 4-year term, which will end in 2021.

Minister Grange said she was “delighted by the news” of her election as Vice President for the General Conference, adding that it is another opportunity “to serve and to ensure that the voices of countries from the Caribbean and Latin America as well as Small Island Developing States are heard and that we all benefit from UNESCO’s work.”

Minister Grange’s election follows her just-concluded successful two-year term as Chair of the UNESCO Committee on Conventions and Recommendations; and her recent re-election as Vice Chair of the Culture Committee of the Organisation of American States.

While in Paris, Minister Grange will also serve as a panellist at the High-Level Meeting of Ministers of Culture.

Minister Grange will return to the island on 21 November 2019.

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Kingston, 5 October 2018 – The Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, the Honourable Olivia Grange, is now in Paris, France attending the 205th session of the UNESCO Executive Board.

Minister Grange was elected earlier this year to the powerful Executive Board which focuses on the development of policies and programmes to direct UNESCO’s activities.  This meeting of the Executive Board will consider, among other things: the budgetary situation of UNESCO, the strategic transformation of the organisation as well as the International Fund for the Promotion of Culture.

Minister Grange is also chairing meetings of the influential Conventions and Recommendations Committee — one of the permanent committees of the Executive Board.  The Conventions and Recommendations Committee considers all questions entrusted to the Executive Board concerning the implementation of UNESCO’s standard-setting instruments, as well as examines communications relating to cases and questions concerning the exercise of human rights in UNESCO’s fields of competence.

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Jamaica has been elected to the Executive Board of Unesco following a successful campaign led by the Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, the Honourable Olivia Grange.

The Honourable Olivia Grange has announced that Cabinet has approved Jamaica’s candidature for one of the four seats allotted to the Caribbean on the Executive Board of The United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) for the period 2017-2021.