Franković wants to move away from the ”summer destination” only label, and open up Dubrovnik’s true potential as a sustainable tourism destination.
As Dubrovacki Dnevnik reports on the 18th of September, 2017, the Mayor of the City of Dubrovnik, Mato Franković and his associates held a meeting with the Director of the Eupolis Group, Ranko Milić, otherwise a consultant for strategic, project, business and institutional development.
A pilot project of Dubrovnik as a city of innovative sustainable tourism was presented.
At the center of the presented pilot project is the optimal use of cultural, natural and human resources, the introduction of order, and the goals also include education on different forms of tourism for economic diversification, targeted investment in the quality of life for residents as well as for tourists and more. In short, all the elements of sustainable development of tourism for the city as a whole were on the table.
Various elements related to the subject at hand were explored, starting with the preparation of planning and technical documentation, the implementation and the monitoring of key infrastructure investments, the development and establishment of [new] standards, rules and policies, an expert visitor management system, marketing, project and financial management, administration and oversight. All of these important factors would help to establish Dubrovnik as a respected center of knowledge and solutions for sustainable tourism, a generator of sustainable development, a city of creativity, innovation, and be seen as not only attractive, but affordable for life and for work.
All participants of the meeting welcomed the new approach to managing the destination and it was rightly regarded as a turning point in how we view tourism in Croatia.
“The City of Dubrovnik has defined both short-term and long-term goals for destination management, and the long-term goal is certainly to position Dubrovnik as an international destination of sustainable tourism,” said Mayor Mato Franković before thanking Ranko Milić for his presentation.
He highlighted the very many problems that the Pearl of the Adriatic faces owing to the densely concentrated daily traffic of cruise ships and the negative effects and marketing which results from it, and also reflected on the positive conclusions from the meeting with heads of tourism industry last week in Hamburg, Germany.
He expressed his satisfaction with the reflections and conclusions and voiced his hope that potential co-operation will be result in the ultimate goal of achieving a higher level of quality of the overall tourism sector in Dubrovnik through the active application of sustainable tourism development practices.
