Seychelles launches its first edition of Cultural District Award

Initiated by the Ministry of Tourism & Culture, the Cultural District Award is an innovative project geared towards making culture everyone’s business as much in the districts and on the national level. The idea of the Cultural District Award is to encourage district administration, private residences, villages, churches, schools, and other groupings in the communities to rally to promote the Seychelles culture and to showcase these cultural assets starting at the district level.

The national Cultural District Award will evaluate the districts’ competitiveness in four categories: built & national heritage, artistic heritage, people living heritage, and traditional games & performances.

Cash prizes will be given in all categories. An overall best cash prize will be given to districts collecting the highest points from members of the juries. Marcel Rosalie, the Director General for Culture in the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, is spearheading the Cultural District Award. Mr. Rosalie said that this award will give culture its rightful place in the communities.

“Culture should not be seen only as a form of entertainment, but also a money-generating machine for the districts,” he said.

Through the launching of the Cultural District Award, the Ministry of Tourism and Culture stands to ensure that culture does not remain solely an affair of the Ministry responsible for culture.

The Ministry of Tourism and Culture’s long-term plan “is for culture to become at the heart of sustainable development in the districts and in so doing in Seychelles.”

The District Cultural Award will be launched on November 27, 2013. Submission of preliminary inventory of cultural assets of districts will be held on January 31, 2014. Districts have until March 31 to submit their registration forms of the categories in which they are participating. A prize-giving ceremony of the Cultural District Award will be held on the third week of November 2014. To ensure that proper guidance advice and assistance are given to districts enrolling in the competition, a Cultural District Award committee comprised of key professionals in the fields of arts, heritage, architecture, history, culture, and tourism will be set up. The Cultural District Award will be a bi-annual event.