Tourism and Strategy Festival ends with an award ceremony.
At the official closing of the 2nd Tourism and Strategy Festival at the Fort Revelin in Dubrovnik, winners of the European Tourism Star Awards were announced. In addition to Dubrovnik, the festival included 17 European towns: Bad Homburg (Germany), Bromia (Malta), Chisinau and Orhei (Moldova), Ferrara (Italy), Graz (Austria), Herceg Novi and Kotor (Montenegro), Le Touquet, Nimes, Ouistreham Riva-Bella and Rueil-Malmaison (France), Plovdiv (Bulgaria), Požarevac (Serbia), Sarajevo (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Solin and Zagreb (Croatia). They all submitted their projects for the competition, reports dubrovacki.hr on April 30, 2016.
The festival, under the name “Challenges of Cultural Tourism in Europe” and under the auspices of the Tourism Ministry, was held in Dubrovnik for the first time. The first edition of the festival took place last year in Rueil Malmaison. The festival was initiated by Andro Vlahušić, the Mayor of Dubrovnik, and Patric Ollier, the Mayor of the French twin-town Rueil Malmaison. The two towns will continue to be alternating hosts of the festival which aims to exchange experiences and different tourism strategies with special emphasis on an assessment and conservation of heritage, and the strategic thinking about tourism and culture.
The winners of the awards were selected by a jury chaired by Krešimir Macan. “It is always interesting to see and compare how different cities approach these issues. There were some truly new ideas, such as Advent in Zagreb which was awarded as the best event, as well as a digital simulation of the landing in Normandy in 1944. However, in certain categories we had tremendous competition, for example, we had too many Roman monuments in the future-oriented category. And we could give only one award – to Nimes. The award almost went to Požarevac, which superbly revitalized its Roman necropolis. In other categories, it was a lot easier to decide. We gave an award to Moldova as well: what they are doing now we already did 5 or 10 years ago, but we should all support their efforts to continue to attract foreign tourists. American Monterey, which is a twin-town of Dubrovnik, is interested in the festival becoming global and not just European. It could happen as early as next year. That moment when you come somewhere, see something and you ask yourself ‘why haven’t we thought of this’, that is when you learn something new”, said Macan.
Here is the complete list of winners: best printed material – Chisinau (Moldova); best video – Kotor (Montenegro), best digital campaign – Ouistreham Riva-Bella (France), best event – Advent in Zagreb, which this winter “conquered” Europe; best branded and designed products – Le Touquet (France); best use of historical heritage for the future of tourism – Nimes (France), which is building a museum of Roman monuments next to a beautifully preserved Roman arena.
“This festival is an original project of Dubrovnik and Rueil-Malmaison, which is a suburb of Paris. It is also the crown achievement of the friendship between our two towns. We wanted to present French and Croatian tourism to other European towns and show them what is the future of tourism. However, this is only the second year and the idea is to use EU funds to develop it further. We also plan to go to Moldova, which is the least developed European country. Tourism is one of a few opportunities which provide an equal chance for development and success to all European cities, and it is a story that will soon develop further. Next year, we will again invite guests from selected cities, pay their expenses and see what they would like to do during the tourist preseason. However, this is not an ordinary tourist fair and we do not sell holidays packages. We are developing our brands here and that is the way we want to help these cities”, said the Mayor of Dubrovnik Andro Vlahušić.
