FOOD & WINE: Georgia lobbies for inclusion of qvevri wine-making method in UNESCO's Intangible Heritage List (hvino.com)

(hvino.com) Georgia is working on inclusion of the country's traditional way of wine making into UNESCO's List of Intangible Cultural Heritage, the Georgian Foreign Minister Maia Panjikidze told journalists after the meeting with the Director General of UNESCO, Irina Bokova in Paris. Georgia's Foreign Minister took part in the work of the 37th session of UNESCO's General Conference.

"We want the tradition of making of the Georgian wine, which is called qvevri wine to be included into UNESCO's List of Intangible Cultural Heritage this year," Panjikidze said.The is sue of giving the status of "Intangible Cultural Heritage" to this method of wine-making was discussed in Tbilisi in February 2012 at the coordination meeting with participation of representatives from UNESCO's National Commission, Patriarchate of Georgia, different agencies, international and non-governmental organizations, as well as Georgian winemakers.

Georgia joined UNESCO Convention for the "Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage" in 2007. The Georgian folklore has already been included in the list of the world's intangible cultural heritages. Earlier, according to the Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili's decree, the Georgian qvevri (clay jug for wine) wine was declared a monument of cultural heritage and was granted the category of national importance.

The Intangible Cultural Heritage programme was established in 2008, when the Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage took effect. The UNESCO lists includes, for example, Armenian cross-stones khachkars and Argentinian tango.