With the TOURISME project reaching its end, on 15 June to be precise, a rather busy period lies ahead for each of project partners regarding their roles and upcoming tasks. The Steering Committee meeting, which took place on 3 February was a perfect moment to reflect and plan ahead.
A lot of effort is currently being put in ensuring that all SMEs will have received equal opportunities for trainings and matchmaking events by April. With the last of the 4 for Spanish SMEs having taken place in Madrid in January, one last is still to come for their counterparts in Italy. Worth mentioning is that the training in Madrid could be considered as the largest TOURISME event so far, with over 70 participants gathered for various activities over two days. The Italian event is planned for March and might as well see all the project partners gathering there for another Steering Committee.
Parallel to the capacity building activities and networking, all the beneficiary SMEs are currently undergoing a monitoring phase in which each reference organisation for each beneficiary country is collecting feedback on the implementation of previously developed schemes. Namely, this involves L’Insitut Paris Region for the French SMEs, Instituto Tecnológico de Canarias for the Spanish SMEs, Regione Autonoma della Sardegna and Sistemi Formativi Confindustria are sharing the monitoring of the Italian SMEs, while the Cypriot SMEs are providing their feedback to the Development Agency of Nicosia. The feedback will allow the evaluation of not only the implementation of the schemes but also the overall success of the project, considering the capacity building activities and the implementation of schemes as something the entire projects has been revolving around so far.
In terms of communication and dissemination, more and more outputs and observations are becoming available which certainly requires enhanced outreach activities and appropriate dissemination. The project will see a series of podcasts recorded and published over the upcoming spring months, involving all the entities who played a role during the project – the partners themselves, beneficiaries, as well as the numerous experts who supported the capacity building activities by pitching in with their skills and knowledge.
Nonetheless, the very key output of the project is about to see its development. It consists of a publication titled “Guidelines for enhanced sustainability in tourism SMEs” which will encompass all the different phases of the project and lessons learnt therein, as well as present accordingly all the acquired knowledge, approaches and guidance for replicating the methodology developed for the project over the last 3 years.
