Environmental Strategies for Sustainable Tourism
The marine-coastal environment cannot be forced into administrative boundaries. This is all the more true for the Tyrrhenian Sea, the real bond of the cooperation area. The above determines a healthy interdependence between the cross-border territories. The environmental quality and economic development of a coastal area are bound to the ecological condition and sustainability of the other areas included in the Programme. Based on the above, the project wants to make the marine-seaside tourism sector more competitive by supporting its sustainable development. It assumes that better environmental quality and lower anthropic load on natural resources can increase the quantity and quality of tourists' environmental awareness and spending capacity throughout the cooperation area. To pursue this objective, local stakeholders (businesses, local administrations and NGOs) must be more involved in defining joint governance plans and project outcomes. In the same way, the project aims to create an eco-tourism brand defined and managed by local bodies and organisations and appropriated by the population. The projects introduces the following innovations: - stakeholder involvement through the establishment of an Advisory Board allowing them to participate in the project choices; - use of an innovative stakeholder engagement method such as Appreciative Inquiry, already successfully tested in important global venues; - use of climate variability data (seasonal forecasts and climate change scenarios) in order to define a sustainable development framework that will anticipate these changes also in the medium-long term.