Overview
Types of Cultural Properties
Other Cultural Properties
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Selected Conservation Techniques
The system of Selected Conservation Techniques was established when the Act on Protection of Cultural Properties was amended in 1975. Under this system, the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology selects and designates traditional techniques and skills that are considered essential for conserving cultural properties, and therefore need to be preserved as Selected Conservation Techniques. The system also creates official recognition for preservation groups and holders of selected conservation techniques.
In order to preserve selected conservation techniques, the national government creates its own documentation and trains successors, as well as providing support necessary for training successors and refining techniques carried out by conservators and preservation groups.
World Heritage and Intangible Cultural Heritage
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Intangible Cultural Heritage
The Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage was adopted by the UNESCO general conference in October 2003, and came into force in April 2006. Japan concluded the convention in June 2004, making it the third in the world to do so.
The convention obliges the signatory countries to identify and catalog intangible cultural heritage in the country. It also stipulates that UNESCO establish the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity (Representative List) and the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding (Urgent Safeguarding List).
