Project title: Turning our villages into tourism destinations
Donor: EU – IPA CBC MNE-KOSCost of the project: 456.106,76 EUR
Amount contributed by donor: 387.690,74 EUR
Implementation period: From 01.02.2023 – 01. 02. 2025.
Regional Development Agency for Bjelasica, Komovi and Prokletije is implementing a project Turning our villages into tourism destinations. Project is funded through the CBC programme Montenegro-Kosovo with the financial support of EU and is going to be implemented from 01/02/2023 to 01/02/2025. Municipality of Peja is the lead applicant on the project, while RDA WEST and RDA BKP are co-applicants from Kosovo and Montenegro.
Overall objective of this action is to improve the volume, quality and visibility of tourism related to valorisation of cultural and natural heritage and values. The specific objective is to support rural tourism by developing tourism offer on village level that is to work with rural destinations on developing their tourism products and services which will result in better experience for visitors, increase their spending on rural tourism services and consequently increase the income for more stakeholders in rural areas.
The activities envisaged in this action are centred around three particular results:
Result 1: Capacities for rural tourism increased. Montenegro has achieved more in rural tourism in terms of engaging and motivating rural households to be involved in this sector. RDA BKP has been a pioneer in this regard in Montenegro. The knowledge and experiences of RDA BKP will be transferred to Agro Tourism LAG in Kosovo, as well as all other interested stakeholders, on how to motivate rural households to start offering tourism services. Both Kosovo and Montenegro will benefit from materials of EuroGites (Montenegro is part of this network) that can be used by rural households on both sides of the border. Particularly important will be EuroGites standards that are qualitative and ensure high quality service provision. RDA BKP recently developed a guidebook for beginners in rural tourism, which will be translated and adapted for Kosovo. Finally, upon completion of mapping in selected communities and development of thematic rural routes, a capacity building activity will be organized for animators and service providers on both sides of the border.
Result 2: Tourism offer in villages developed. This is the most important activity cluster of this action, as it represents the most tangible improvements that will happen on the ground. In this activity set, the team will select 15 villages on both sides of the border that will be targeted by improvements, and in selected villages mapping exercise will be conducted in order to select the most important cultural and natural attractions for the thematic, rustic trails. The research conducted recently in Montenegro shows that visitors complained about lack of signalisation to point towards the villages and towards tourism service providers, and such signage will be ensured through this project. Another complaint from the guests is that even though they are usually very happy with the service in the household they chose, they don’t have additional offer in the village that would fill their time. Families with children need playgrounds, they want to visit other families that provide other services, they want to have bikes for rental and explore surroundings. Improvements need to be made in actual rural tourism households as well, to ensure high quality service and positive experience of the guests, and having households that offer high quality service will be a learning model for other households and a benchmark that they need to compare with. For that reason, the team will select households for improvement, for piloting certain activities that can be replicated, such as proper arrangement of yards to be comfortable, neat and reflective of local traditions, outdoors seating arrangement etc.
Result 3: Tourism offer in villages promoted. None of the activities from result 2 would be sustainable if not for proper promotion and presentation of the offer developed. That is the purpose of activities in this set. For the thematic trails developed the team will develop info boards for each point, after collecting information that is correct and relevant to present to tourists. Aside from info boards, signage will be developed, brochures, video clips and all of that information will be uploaded to websites of Tourism Organisation Peja, and rural tourism association in Montenegro. Additionally, with 4 communities the team will work on developing promotional events, striving for their repetition each year so that such events can also become tourism offer of those communities. For that reason, the events that will be supported will be either outdoor activities (fishing, mountain biking, rock climbing or similar event), or some traditional or cultural event related to rural areas (celebration of harvest, or going to katuns, or dyeing of wool or something similar).
