- Cultural Heritage
- Cultural Management Training
- Cultural Industries
- Eligibility Criteria
- Current Projects
- Project Archives
Our Mission
The Inter-American Culture and Development Foundation (ICDF) seeks to strengthen cultural development in Latin America and the Caribbean through plans, programs, and projects designed to promote socio-economic sustainable ways of reducing poverty, improving quality-of-life, and achieving greater social equity in the region.
Read More >>Our Projects
The projects supported by the ICDF help to preserve the cultural patrimony, increase the community participation and education, strengthen cultural industries, and improve the living conditions of people in Latin America and the Caribbean through culture.
Strengthening of Cultural Industries
In the 1980s, UNESCO brought together a group of experts to discuss the role of cultural and creative industries in Latin America and the Caribbean. Pooling their thoughts and experience, they arrived at a definition: “a cultural industry is held to exist when cultural goods and services are produced, reproduced, stored, or distributed on industrial and commercial lines, that is to say on a large scale and in accordance with a strategy based on economic considerations.“ (Source: Zubiria, Sergio. Economics of Culture). The term was later broadened to cultural and creative industries, to include other cultural manifestations such as theater, opera, and cultural tourism that require no industrial process for their creation and production.
Both definitions regard cultural and creative industries as representing sectors that bring together the creation, production, and marketing of goods and services based on cultural values, traditions, and expressions. Also under both definitions, the cultural goods and services produced by cultural and creative industries are protected by copyright laws.
The fields covered by the definition of cultural and creative industries vary from country to country. They generally include publishing, audiovisual and multimedia, film, visual arts, performing arts, crafts and design, architecture, cultural tourism, and other industries.
Cultural and creative industries play a key role in the production, promotion, and distribution of cultural goods and services, making them freely accessible to all segments of society in Latin America and the Caribbean and promoting them in foreign markets.
