- 12-03-2024 09:30
- Velizar Petrov
Since the
beginning of the year, the Regional Development Agency with a Business Support Center
for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Plovdiv is working on the "MYSTICAL
DANUBE" project, co-financed by the EU through the ИНТЕРРЕГ VI-B Programme
"Danube Region" 2021-2027, in partnership with organizations from
Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Serbia, Hungary, Croatia
and Montenegro. The lead partner is the Agency for the Development of Rural
Areas of Zadar Region.
The main
project objective is to develop a coordinated joint transnational approach in
the valorization of natural and intangible cultural heritage as a tourism asset
in rural and less visited areas in the Danube Region.
Transnational
approach will be reached through joint cooperation between different
stakeholders on local, regional and national levels, from all participating
countries and in experience and knowledge exchange. Local community is a great
resource that can enhance economic development of a certain region, and at the
same time feel included and as a contributing member of the community and
society in general.
We want to
include local community, and especially the disadvantaged groups in creation of
community-based tourism services that will be part of a new thematic route (the
Green and Mystical Danube Storytelling Route) created within the project, as a
social innovation.
Also, we want to include the local community
members (special focus on disadvantaged groups in each region) in capacity
building activities for the provision of these services which will enhance
their employment, social inclusion and economic development in the DRP area.
The project’s
main outputs will include 1 joint strategy for the valorization of natural and
intangible cultural heritage in rural and less visited areas of the Danube
region, 10 Pilot site Action plans for the development of sustainable community
tourism services and products, 23 partner organisations cooperating across borders
and a jointly developed solution for transnational tourism development tested
as a pilot action on 10 Pilot sites as a new thematic route, the Green and
Mystical Danube Storytelling Route, with the mobile application showing the
route and its features in terms of sites and available touristic services and
set up contact points at Pilot sites
Contact points
with the mobile application will be a place for local stories and myths to be
narrated by newly trained local storytellers, but also to transpose and
introduce people to other Pilot sites with their stories and legends. Our
innovative approach combines natural and intangible cultural heritage as a new
tourism asset within the transnational context that will enhance local
community employment and community development.
You can also
receive regular information about our new project on social networks:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mysticaldanube
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mystical_danube
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/mystical-danube
#Interreg #DanubeRegion #RuralDevelopment #MysticalDanube
This paper was supported as part of PROJECT MYSTICAL DANUBE, an
Interreg Danube Region Programme project co-funded by the European Union.