Empowering Local Communities through Digital transformation for Recovery, Conservation and Promotion A Focus on Cultural and Urban Heritage Sites in the Middle East

At WUF11, UN Habitat presented the experience of applying the digital tools within the Urban recovery framework | UN-Habitat (unhabitat.org) in the Syrian context, with specific
consideration to urban culture heritage contexts, including its responses to recovery and conservation. In fact, Smart technologies and ideas are relevant for all cities and settlements as they enable to do city management and operation in a better way to improve the quality of life. Whilst maximizing the benefits of digital technology and innovation for urban sustainability, localized approach calls to concerted efforts to adopt people-centered initiatives and ensure inclusive outcomes. This approach was adopted in Syria through discussing the difficulty of Developing an Integrated Smart Management to conserve the old cities Damascus and Aleppo as continuously living cities was conceived to identify smart interventions and the application of localized digital solutions people-centered and innovation driven approaches to help the city to become more inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable. In addition to the continuous work to broaden URF topics including the culture heritage and the range of priority responses with a view to scaling-up operations over time. To reach this goal, nimble and innovative approaches have been applied, such as the application of digital forms in participatory damage assessment process, towards effectively applying the mandate of the agency to a crisis and disaster context. UN-Habitat’s Syria Programme has been at the forefront of both theoretical and practical approaches to achieving resilience and recovery results that advance upon the humanitarian response in Syria’s urban heritage areas, by:

1. Conduct integrated damage database that supports the documentation and the conservation of the heritage assets and promote the safe a return to buildings and informs the prioritization of recovery interventions.
2. Prepare the area-based urban heritage recovery interventions to foster resilience, cultural identity and social cohesion consolidation.
3. Restore sustainable access to basic services, safe housing and protect tenure security of displaced residents, and livelihoods opportunities.