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EcoTour, EcoCure!

2024-1-AT01-KA152-YOU-0002261442024Mobility of young peopleongoing
Countries: AT|RO|BE|PL|UA · Grant: €57,792
Environment and climate changeGreen skillsGreen transport and mobility

Objectives

'EcoTour, EcoCure!' is a Youth Exchange project aimed at promoting and forwarding the principles of the EU Green Deal when it comes to tourism activities within the European Continent. Within its scopes, a number of 40 young people, aged 18 to 30, stemming from 5 EU and Candidate States will reunite on a 9 day learning journey which has the goal of promoting more sustainable methods of conducting recreational activities. With an ever increasing number of visitors witnessed by countries all across Europe, there is an ascending trend towards increased pollution from this sector of the economy, whereby "estimates for tourism expansion indicate that emissions from tourism activities will more than quadruple by 2035" (Yang, S., 2022). Given this, it is crucial to address the topic of tourism in order to protect our environment, and instill youth with a more eco-friendly approach when it comes to the tourism industry, with the risk of not addressing this issue being that of off-putting the EU Green Deal goals for 2050. As such, we have created a comprehensive curriculum meant to not only improve young people's Green Skills, but also consolidate over the Green Deal's pillar of 'Economic Growth Decoupled from Resource Use'. We believe that this sector of the economy, in combination with conservation efforts of natural environments, can lead to a sustainable business environment, and has the opportunity to stimulate additional revenue streams, especially for less developed areas within partner countries. In order to reach our desired learning outcomes, we will familiarize participants with the practices and principles necessary in order to create their very own Carbon Neutral Tour. Given that flight emissions are some of the biggest polluters when it comes to this sector, we are embedding both direct and indirect measures to teach participants about more sustainable methods of transportation. Indirectly we will make use of Green Travel, giving participants hands-on experience over how our continent's extensive rail connections are adequate to travel internationally, proving how easy it is to reach different corners of the EU by train, whilst directly we plan to familiarize participants with Policies and Directives given by this supranational institution in order to make eco-friendly methods of transportation more appealing. In this sense, we jointly discover the larger EU Rail Transport Policy, aimed at modernizing and better connecting Europe through carbon neutral, highspeed rail transportation, as well as familiarize them with different programmes such as DiscoverEU and InterRail, allowing them to travel in a more economic and eco-friendly manner across different nations. Furthermore, we wish to involve both theoretical and practical skills for our participants, hosting activity sessions outdoors, at locations of interest when it comes to the topic of ecotourism. As such, we will conduct our sessions at different locations, such as the Furtherteich Lake in order to discuss water conservation, Graggenschlucht Waterfall and Forest for silvic preservation, and the Zirbitzkogel mountain peak for hiking experiences and relevant safety considerations. These experiences are meant to inspire participants towards coming up with ideas in their local communities about exciting outdoors activities which would promote their region and natural beauty, while at the same time having minimal interference with the natural habitat. We are furthermore planning a study visit to Hallstatt within our project's scopes, to discuss with representatives of the Salzkammergut Region about best practice solutions to protect the environment in high-demand touristic areas. In order to achieve the best learning outcomes, we aim at fulfilling all the criteria of the Erasmus Inclusion and Diversity Policy, thus ensuring that people from disadvantaged backgrounds are able to join our project, together with sharing their thoughts and opinions, engaging in qualitative intercultural dialogue, whilst at the same time broadening their professional horizons through our activities. All sessions will be held through non-formal methods of learning, allowing participants to freely express their creativity and leadership skills, with the Dissemination Campaign strongly involving the local communities of our 5 partner countries, with our participants putting in practice what they have learned in Austria by creating their very own EcoTourism events in their region, promoting the natural beauty of their surrounding environment. In conclusion, 'EcoTour EcoCure!' is a Youth Exchange project constructed around the goals of the EU Green Deal, tackling particularly the phenomena of Tourism, in an effort to create more eco-consciousness when engaging in recreational travel when it comes to youth. A key focus is placed on improving the Green Skills of young people, while at the same time stimulating their creativity by channeling it through entrepreneurship.

Project partners (5)