Plans to Save Meymand's Agricultural Heritage

The World Heritage Base in charge of management and conservation of Meymand Cultural Landscape in Kerman Province plans to revive the agricultural heritage of the site in collaboration with farmers. Large swathes of farming lands, especially dryland farms, in the region have been abandoned in recent years due to long-term drought, wiping out a key aesthetic feature of the landscape.

Restoring the area's farming legacy has been among the main focuses of the world heritage base over the past year, IRNA reported. According to Mahnaz Ashrafi, director of the base, the center has conducted studies on how to reinstitute dryland farming in the region.

"In cooperation with experienced experts and farmers, indigenous seeds have been planted across abandoned lands since last year and the results were favorable," she said.

The project aims to set up a laboratory for cultivating seeds best suited for the climate and to reproduce regionally adapted plant species in the coming years.  

"The scheme will not only improve the aesthetic beauty of the landscape in the long run, but will also attract more farmers to the region and boost the local economy," Ashrafi said.

At present, 15 farmers are cooperating with the base in the project. The ancient village of Meymand is Iran’s oldest surviving village that has been inhabited for nearly 3,000 years. The Cultural Landscape of Meymand was inscribed on the National Heritage List in 2001.  It was set to receive world heritage status in 2013, but the jury found its dossier to be incomplete, but it eventually managed to receive UNESCO’s World Heritage Status in 2015 along with the historical city of Susa in Khuzestan Province during the 39th session of the World Heritage Committee in Bonn, Germany.