We were honoured to host the UK National Commission for UNESCO South East England Local to Global Summer Workshop 2026 last week in the impressive Brighton Centre conference venue, at the heart of The Living Coast UNESCO Biosphere.

This event brought together all the UNESCO designated sites in London and the South East of England – including representatives from the Isle of Wight Biosphere, Canterbury Cathedral World Heritage Site, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew World Heritage Site and the Tower of London World Heritage site alongside the team from the UK National Commission for UNESCO.

We were welcomed by Professor Anne Anderson, Chair and Non-Executive Director for Higher Education at the UK National Commission for UNESCO before Matt Rabagliati, Head of Policy, Research and Communications at the National Commission introduced some of the initial findings from the Measuring the Value of Multi Stakeholder Partnerships in the UK’s UNESCO sites project.

This project, part of the National Lottery Heritage Funded Local to Global project, is exploring the partnerships that are behind every single UNESCO designation in the UK.  The knowledge gained from this in depth study will support future strategic development across the UK’s UNESCO sites, as well as identify how the UK National Commission are best placed to support individual sites, the networks of different types of UNESCO sites, as well as the regional clusters of UNESCO sites at local, national and international level into the future.  The results of the project are due to be published in the Autumn.

We were very grateful to Jo Williams of Experience Sussex and Lynn Trapano of the East and West Sussex, Brighton & Hove Local Visitor Economy Partnership for joining us on the day to highlight some of the brilliant partnership projects that they are involved with, both regionally, nationally and internationally, that support our local visitor economy – one of the most important economies in our region.

Sarah Dobson, Programme Manager for The Living Coast Biosphere, then led a session exploring the development of shared narratives for our South East cluster of UNESCO sites, exploring the key elements that connect all our sites and make the South East region so rich in cultural and environmental heritage.

The event was a very positive example of the huge wealth of knowledge, passion and experience for our regional, national and international environmental and cultural heritage that is supported by UNESCO both in the UK and internationally, and a great opportunity to strengthen existing partnerships and build new relationships with our neighbouring UNESCO sites across England.  We look forward to sharing the results of the Local to Global programme across our Biosphere Partnership in the Autumn, as well as continuing to develop shared identities and projects with our fellow UNESCO South East sites.