During 23-25 April 2013, a national workshop under the theme “Historic Urban Landscapes: Muharraq as a case study” was held in Muharraq, Bahrain. It was organized by the Regional Arab Centre for World Heritage, cooperating with UNESCO. As the first of its kind in the Arab World, the workshop mainly aimed at understanding the historical and architectural assets of Muharraq City and potential for the city to be a historic urban landscape, and put forward recommendations on application of HUL approach in Muharraq. UNESCO and international experts, officials from the Ministry of Culture and the Municipality of Muharraq，and scholars from Bahrain University (UoB) Center for Historical Studies attended the workshop.

During the workshop, a series of presentations were given by the Ministry of Culture and the Municipality of Muharraq, concerning urban planning policies, the history of Muharraq since the beginning of the 20th century, the current trends in the development of the city, the protection of Bahrain’s urban heritage and the role of World Heritage in the preservation process. Besides, three international experts reported respectively the new UNESCO Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape and its objectives, the application of HUL to the conservation management of Cairo, and the application to the planning of Zanzibar. Next to these presentations, three sites visits to Muharraq were organized, which allowed the participants to experience the city in its broader context, both during the day and evening hours.

In addition, the experts informed participants that using the HUL Recommendation as a tool may require support and endeavor from different levels, such as the involvement of the community and civil society, the mobilization of resources through public-private partnerships, and the integration within the urban planning tools of measures for the safeguarding of heritage and environmental features etc.

Therefore, In the premise of highlighting and promoting Muharraq’s unique historic character and cultural identity, the workshop recommended: 1) The Ministry of Culture should initiate a process at the highest level, applying the HUL approach, to safeguard and promote the natural, cultural and socio-economic assets of Muharraq; 2) To this end it’s necessary that a vision for a short-and mid-term strategy (2015-20) be elaborated, which is to be integrated in the framework of the Bahrain 2030 Vision; 3). In order to implement the strategy above, a mechanism has to be set up based on the involvement of the pubic and private stakeholders towards the adoption of appropriate tools to implement a set of actions and projects for an integrated conservation and development policy.