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Culture and cultural heritage are resources for urban development with all its social, ecological and economic dimensions. Against this background, the Partnership on Culture/ Cultural Heritage, created in November 2018 under the Urban Agenda for the EU, is aimed at identifying and promoting actions that improve the legislation, the financial capacity and the knowledge transfer in the field of culture and cultural heritage at EU level.

The Partnership brings together more than 20 partners from EU member states, regional bodies, cities, the European Commission and European stakeholder organisations. Germany/the Federal Ministry of the Interior, Building and Community (BMI) supported by the Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR) and Italy/the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism jointly with the Italian Agency for Territorial Cohesion are the coordinators. The Partnership recently finalised its preparatory work and finished the Orientation Paper. It focuses on a holistic and integrated approach to deal with culture and cultural heritage and identifies seven main topics: Cultural tourism; Creative and cultural industries; Transformation, adaptive reuse and urban reconversion; Financial sustainability and funding; Resilience of cultural and natural heritage; Integrated and interdisciplinary approaches for governance; Cultural services and culture for inclusive cities. The Orientation Paper was presented to the Directors-General responsible for Urban Matters (DGUM) in Helsinki in October 2019 for adoption. The Partnership will now identify those actions necessary to develop an action plan to better support culture and cultural heritage as means to foster sustainable urban development processes.