Arts and Culture Minister, Paul Mashatile together with the British Council, Dr Nicola Brewer signed Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation in the field of Arts and Culture. The event took place on the 16th of April 2013 at the National Library of South Africa (NLSA), Pretoria.

As part of the agreement the two countries established links between art festivals in both countries and on collaboration with arts institutions. The MoU also look at establishing professional and creative links between the arts institutions, curators, festival directors, producers, individual artists and arts administration.

The statement of Intent on Bilateral Cooperation was signed in 2005 which preceded the Film Co-production Treaty of 2006. Since then eight films have been certified. The NLSA also signed the new MoU with British Library in February 2013 where the British Library committed to train the NLSA staff in areas of digitisation and preservation.

Through this Memorandum of Understanding, we will specifically focus on among others;

• Sharing experiences intended to promote and develop the creative industries in both our countries
• Establishment of links between arts festivals in both our countries
• Collaboration between artists and arts institutions and
• Artistic exchanges as well as joint publications.

The Department of Arts and Culture and the British Council will be responsible for the strategic direction and the implementation of the MoU in consultation with the Department of International Relations and Cooperation in SA and Foreign Commonwealth Office in the UK.