Representatives from Asian national museums have gathered at the fourth Meeting of the Asian National Museum Association (ANMA), which opened in Hanoi on October 8.

They came from Japan, Cambodia, India, China, Malaysia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Nepal, Laos and host Vietnam, which is the ANMA Chair for the 2012-2013 tenure.

Themed “Museums contribute to social changes,” the two-day conference has focused on how museums contribute to changing awareness of heritage conservation and development, heritage and museum tourism and their educational role.

Director of the Vietnam National Museum of History Nguyen Van Cuong represented the host country to deliver a speech with the same title as that of the conference.

Participants also heard experience in preserving and utilising heritages shared by heads of national museums from Japan, Cambodia, India and China, among others.

The conference admitted the national museum of Laos as an official member of ANMA. It also agreed to elect Singapore as the host country of the next meeting of the association.

Established in 2007, ANMA aims to enhance mutual understanding by implementing collaborative programmes concerning museum-related activities, share knowledge on cultural heritages kept by member museums and encourage the utilisation of such knowledge, facilitate the richness of Asian cultures known widely to the world and exchanges in information, human resources and exhibitions.

The biennial ANMA conference is held in turn by each member. The association’s third event was hosted by China in 2011, during which Vietnam was elected as the ANMA Chair for the 2012-2013.-VNA