In over a year of the formulation of the demand to create a culture fund in the Republic of Moldova, the authorities haven’t reacted, said Rusanda Curcă, director of the Coalition of the Independent Cultural Sector of the Republic of Moldova, noting that the subject concerning the creation of a culture fund has been developed staring with last year through an advocacy campaign. Different models of foreign funds and the structure that can work in Moldova were made public.
“The Coalition during two years has implemented several large advocacy programs that treat major issues related to the support for the independent cultural sector. It goes to the creation of new financing mechanisms and the improvement of the existing ones. Here, we refer particularly to the campaign regarding the creation of the culture fund,” Rusanda Curcă stated in a news conference staged at IPN within the second edition of the program of events Alternative Cultural Spaces 2023.
She noted that with the assistance of the EU Delegation to Moldova, an international laboratory on financing mechanisms in culture in the Eastern Partnership countries was held last November. There were invited directors of culture funds of Estonia, Romania, and Croatia, cultural policy experts from Georgia and Belarus. “The culture fund is an instrument that in general changes the way in which culture is financed by the state, the logic and the government of public resources for culture as there should be a structure in which civil society and experts are people who manage and govern this financing mechanism, while the Ministry deals with monitoring and assessment rather than with decision making,” said Rusanda Curcă.
This January, the Coalition of the Independent Cultural Sector of the Republic of Moldova, staged a public presentation of the culture fund model that it worked out together with culture workers of the country based on recommendations of directors of foreign culture funds. “The Ministry gave the green light and we expected that they will set up such a support mechanism, but no step has been taken in this direction so far. The Ministry opposes the institution of such mechanisms,” stated the Coalition’s director.
Rusanda Curcă noted that the fund would support the whole sector, including representatives of civil society. Independent artists, NGOs that implement cultural projects, state public institutions of culture that organize activities outside their basic program can be the beneficiaries of the culture fund. For example, the National Museum of Arts can apply to such a fund with a project that does not refer to classical art exhibition, but combines exhibition with music, poetry, video etc. The culture fund will abide by such a principle as clear separation of responsibilities between those who manage the fund and those who take decisions as the fund management team would include representatives of the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Culture, while the decisions regarding the assessment of projects would be taken only by professionals from the field.
The Coalition’s director said that transparency is another principle. All the projects that would apply for funding would be assessed online. The assessment and monitoring would be the duty of professionals from the field. The fund should consist of percentages from an economic parameter, for example from the GDP, or form particular taxes paid by business entities to the state budget. The fund could be governed by an Administration Board and an executive director. The Coalition is considering launching a campaign to inform about the necessity of a culture fund in regions.
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