The project “Virtual Forum of Ministers of Culture and Officials in Charge of Cultural Policies of Latin America and the Caribbean” of the Forum of Ministers of Culture was launched by the delegation of the Dominican Republic in the XII Forum of Ministers (Santo Domingo, 21-24 March 2001).

To implement this outstanding and important regional project, the Forum of Ministers requested the immediate support and cooperation of the UNESCO Regional Office for Culture in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Later, during its actual implementation, and with the contribution granted by UNESCO, the original concept expanded to become the “Portal of Culture of Latin America and the Caribbean” (http://www.lacult.org).

The first digital version of the Project was launched during the XIII Forum of Ministers, (Cuenca, Ecuador, 6-8 November, 2002), largely expanded and improved with the suggestions made by Member States of the Forum.

The “Portal of Culture of Latin America and the Caribbean” is, therefore, the oldest Project of the Forum still active. It is coordinated and funded by the UNESCO Regional Office for Culture in Latin America and the Caribbean, with the support from a Network of National Coordinators appointed by the highest cultural authorities of the Member States in the region.

It is accessible in Internet since 2002 in Spanish, and in English since 2004. The French version will be launched before the end of 2009.

The “Portal of Culture of Latin America and the Caribbean” is the threshold to the rich cultural diversity of the region. It provides information about the Ministers and agencies in charge of Culture as well as about other cultural institutions in the region, cultural policies and cultural agenda. It publishes news on the current cultural scenario in the region and provides access to relevant documents, including programmes and major UNESCO normative instruments in the sphere of Culture.

It also publishes exclusive information, namely documents of the meetings of the Forum of Ministers of Culture and Officials in Charge of Cultural Policies of Latin America and the Caribbean and all the 15 issues of the annual Oralidad, Anuario Para el Rescate de la Tradición Oral de América Latina y el Caribe (Oralidad, Annual for the Reclaim of the Oral Traditions in Latin America and the Caribbean), from the very first published in 1988.

The Portal also has a specialized page dedicated to the UNESCO “The Slave Route Project". The page provides also access to the Web version of the multimedia Places of Memory of the Slave Route in the Latin Caribbean, a publication about the 25 Places of Memory of "The Slave Route" identified in Aruba, Cuba, Haiti and Dominican Republic.

Director Herman van Hooff

General Coordination Olga Rufins Machin

Programming and design Junior González Ramos

Contents Olga Rufins Machin, Elba Suárez Menéndez

Translation Ana Elena de Arazoza Rodríguez (English), Aurora Fibla Madrigal (French)

Network of National Coordinators Agustín Jeannot (Argentina), Suzette Zayden (Belize); Rubén Andino (Chile), César Alfredo Parra Ortega (Colombia), Ana Lorena Herrera Loaiza (Costa Rica), Idelsis Gallardo (Cuba), Ricardo Bracamonte and Claudia de Campos (El Salvador), Alfonso Castellanos Ribot (Mexico), Danya Rush (Grenada), Roland Bélizaire (Haiti), Isadora Paz (Honduras), Emilio Chavarría Vega, (Nicaragua), Lilia Beatriz Peña Galeano (Paraguay), Blanca Margarita Alva Guerrero (Peru), Luis Teófilo Terrero (Dominican Republic) Anthony Theobalds (St. Vincent and the Grenadines)