This project involves rural regions of Europe countries, territories with a lower level of productivity and employment but rich in landscapes and heritage. Unfortunately, this potential is not fully exploited due to the current economic situation of the rural and mountain areas of the European countries which remain, in many cases, basically marginalized. No elaborated thematic product exists, especially in the less visited areas of the south and east of Europe, so far excluded by the market. ESCAPE2 project addresses specific needs detected in these areas: relatively scarce or non-existent experiences of rural tourism with integrated strategies and integrated development policy/territorial focused on tourism as a key element for economic growth; -low level of awareness about the economic potentiality of rural areas and added value tourism chains; -Lack of quality facility or service for tourists; -need of a high level of engagement and stronger communication by all stakeholders at all level (within the whole tourism chain) and lack of cooperation among local actors/stakeholders/policy-makers;-lack of clear definition of the market segment to be attracted (kinds of visitor);-lack of efficient marketing activities and integrated communication plan targeting potential tourists/beneficiaries, lovers of fitness activities and outdoor sports for the health, physical shape and to escape from the daily routine. This said, the main objective of the project is to develop a common STRATEGY that integrates all participating countries and allows for an effective impact on local communities and economy. Project activities are set to reach the objectives and the main results and expected outcomes and will involve actors that often have no access to knowledge and information and lack the capacity to ensure the viability of their natural and cultural heritage and need to be strongly informed, trained and supported to plan and adopted an innovative tourism strategy where they can play an important role. They are: country houses, holidays farms with or without restaurants (local gastronomy and typical products), restaurants, cellars, stores of local and biological products and farm holidays with local products for sale (km 0 products), chefs, farming and other primary producers, handcrafts shops and artisan businesses, tourism services and shops, operators organising open local tours, etc. At a national level, the project will facilitate the creation of actors/stakeholders/policy-makers networks through the participation in ESCAPE2 local events (dissemination events/local seminars), and it will transfer to these networks all relevant knowledge about rural tourism marketing strategies in synergy with national/local tourism strategies. At cross-border level, we will adopt a common transferable methodology-innovative/integrated strategy for sustainable exploitation of cultural/natural/historical resources as economic assets, to create a Cross-Border Network on High Quality Tourism Rural Development. This Strategy will be created confronting local situations, sharing best practices and finding common needs: the network will be actually built amongst similar destinations to develop the benchmark values necessary for quality comparison. This result will be reach by implementing the IO1. In one year, we want to map the main stakeholders, to realize an updated market research and share all the best practices referred to the rural tourism. All the documents of the output will be included in an OVERVIEW REPORT which will serve as the basis of the IO2, namely to set up the training course. The second and third output will result on tools specifically produced to reach the overall Strategy. The project will develop contents and curricula based on the results of mapping and matching and will test and pilot the training for 3 months by organizing online courses delivered through the project platform.
The main objective of the project was to develop a common STRATEGY that could integrate all participating countries and allow for an effective impact on local communities and the economy. At a national level, we wanted to facilitate the creation of actors/stakeholders/policy-makers networks through the participation in ESCAPE2 local events (dissemination events/local seminars), and we wanted to transfer to these networks all relevant knowledge about rural tourism marketing strategies in synergy with national/local tourism strategies. At the cross-border level, we wanted to adopt a common transferable methodology-innovative/integrated strategy for sustainable exploitation of cultural/natural/historical resources as economic assets, to create a Cross-Border Network of High-Quality Tourism Rural Development. This Strategy was created by confronting local situations, sharing best practices, and finding common needs: the network was built amongst similar destinations to develop the benchmark values necessary for quality comparison.
This project involves rural regions of Europe countries, territories with a lower level of productivity and employment but rich in landscapes and heritage. Unfortunately, this potential is not fully exploited due to the current economic situation of the rural and mountain areas of the European countries which remain, in many cases, basically marginalized. No elaborated thematic product exists, especially in the less visited areas of the south and east of Europe, so far excluded by the market. ESCAPE2 project addressed specific needs detected in these areas: relatively scarce or non-existent experiences of rural tourism with integrated strategies and integrated development policy/territorial focused on tourism as a key element for economic growth; -low level of awareness about the economic potentiality of rural areas and added value tourism chains; -Lack of quality facility or service for tourists; -need of a high level of engagement and stronger communication by all stakeholders at all level (within the whole tourism chain) and lack of cooperation among local actors/stakeholders/policymakers;-lack of clear definition of the market segment to be attracted (kinds of visitor);-lack of efficient marketing activities and integrated communication plan targeting potential tourists/beneficiaries, lovers of fitness activities and outdoor sports for the health, physical shape and to escape from the daily routine.