The aim of the project was to structure, implement, test and disseminate the "Recovery Tourism after Natural Disaster" training programme, which aims to up-skilling or re-skilling tourism professionals from companies, institutions and NGOs, stakeholders and members of local communities, university students from tourism and business courses. They will acquire the skills to have a positive impact on the area affected by a natural disaster, reactivating economic activities, improve the attractiveness and image of the area and also find new employment if they have lost their job due to the emergency or crisis following the natural disaster. The content of the course builds competences in tourism disaster management and the restoration of the tourist image after the occurrence of a natural disaster, thanks to face-to-face teaching sessions, Open Educational Resource resources, laboratory activities provided according to the alternative didactic method of serious play, to enhance emerging strategy making in complex, uncertain and "disruptive" contexts, such as those affected by natural disasters.
The RETOURN (REcovery TOURrism after Natural disaster) project is a vocational training project addressing the lack of preparation and expertise of figures operating in the tourism sector on risk management and the recovery of damage resulting from natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods , hurricanes and pandemics such as the one caused by COVID-19. The partnership represents European communities and territories affected by various natural disasters in recent years includes Chamber of Commerce, VET providers, University, Associations from Italy, Greece, Slovenia, Hungary, and Germany. The premises of the project have been confirmed in the research and implementation conducted with communities affected by natural disasters, proving that it is fundamental, especially in the post-disaster phase, to implement education in emergency management, prevention, the revitalization of communication and the reconstruction of territories starting from tourism, with a bottom-up participatory approach. To do this, the project achieved the goal of proposing and testing a training program that facilitates and recovers the touristic development in areas affected by natural disasters, creating the figure of the Tourism Recovery Expert.