A/HRC/58/60/Add.1 obligation to consider its analysis. In discussions with the Special Rapporteur, officials of the Institute admitted that there was a knowledge gap with respect to cultural rights. They were working to fill that gap and would take advantage of the visit of the Special Rapporteur to advance that work. C. System of cultural governance 23. Chile is party to seven of the main UNESCO treaties concerning heritage and has seven properties and three living practices inscribed on the World Heritage List and the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, respectively. UNESCO has a regional presence in Chile and conducts various programmes jointly with the Government, including on the promotion of the Mapuche language and related teachers’ training, and on cultural workers. 24. The National Commission for UNESCO was created in 1980 under the responsibility of the Ministry of Education. It is tasked with national coordination of all work on the UNESCO conventions and has established, to that end, intersectoral round tables with all ministries. At the time of the visit, only two representatives of ministries were involved in its work, and it had no full-time employee. It therefore had no independence from the Government and was not equipped to fulfil its coordination and monitoring work. 25. In 2017, the Ministry of Cultures, Arts and Heritage was created (Law 21.045), with a broad and holistic vision of culture that aligns in many ways with cultural rights. 4 It benefited from prior consultations with Indigenous Peoples, who insisted on pluralizing the concept of “culture”. The law was amended twice in 2019 to create a National Council for Scenic Arts (Law 21.175) and to provide for the digital transformation of the Ministry (Law 21.180). The Ministry has representations in all regions of the country, but most of the decision-making power is centralized. The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and the related cuts in funding had an impact on the first years of operation of the Ministry. At the time of the visit, the Ministry employed about 3,000 persons across the country, but benefited from only 0.44 per cent of the national budget. 26. The National Council for Cultures, the Arts and Heritage is composed of representatives from ministries, academia, applied arts and crafts, Indigenous Peoples and migrants. The National Monuments Council is in charge of the recognition (listing), protection and conservation of expressions of heritage. There are approximately 75 theatres in the country, and the Ministry of Cultures, Arts and Heritage has increased the number of cultural centres over the past few years. A policy of developing “points of culture” across the territory was slowly being implemented, an approach the Special Rapporteur supports. 27. At the time of the visit, the country did not have a policy on the creative economy or a baseline for cultural work, but certain processes were under way. In 2021, the Ministry engaged in the creation of a registry of national actors in the field of culture and heritage in order to map the territorial resources and stakeholders and to better understand the needs. In 2022, it adopted a “decent cultural work agenda”, under which a series of social dialogues was organized with the technical support of UNESCO and ILO. In March 2024, the Government adopted decree No. 11, creating an interministerial committee to work on the status of cultural workers (Comité Interministerial para un Estatuto del Trabajo Cultural). To accompany this process, the Ministry of Cultures, Arts and Heritage engaged in a process supported by the UNESCO-Aschberg Programme for Artists and Cultural Professionals. The Special Rapporteur commends the Ministry on this process and is looking forward to hearing more about the work of the committee to better define and protect the status of cultural workers. 28. The Ministry has a national Subdirectorate for Indigenous Peoples, which include Afro-Chileans, tasked with revitalizing cultures, fostering the transmission of languages and 4 6 Available at www.bcn.cl/leychile/navegar?idNorma=1110097&idParte=9845581&idVersion=201711-03 (in Spanish). GE.25-01340