HOW WAS THE PROJECT IN CULTURA VERITAS DEVELOPED – FROM THE IDEA TO IMPLEMENTATION
The idea for the project In cultura veritas emerged as a result of recognizing mutual need for cultural tourism revival in the cross-border area between Croatia and Slovenia. During the project preparation, in the cross-border area between Zagreb county (Croatia) and sub-regions of Obsotelje and Kozjansko (Slovenia) around 80 cultural heritage objects were identified along nearly 200 kilometers of wine roads. Wine tradition is an important element of this area’s culture while objects and customs in relation to wine production represent common part of the local museums’ exhibitions.
Tourism development trends in Europe and worldwide imply growing interest for tourism products and services connected to wine production and local cultural heritage. This connection has been missing in the cross-border area between Zagreb County and subregions of Obsotelje and Kozjansko, which leads to degradation of cultural heritage objects, weak stakeholder collaboration, insignificant tourism arrivals and generally insufficient economic activities.
Project partners have approached the project idea in order to eliminate identified problems and improve utilisation of the key tourism potentials in the cross border area for long-term contribution to sustainable economic and social development.
The project has been offcially approved in June, 2018 and the project implementation started on 1 August, 2018.
OBJECTIVES AND RESULTS
The main objective of the project is to contribute to active protection of cultural heritage objects in the cross-border area by creating tourism destination that will in an inovative way merge cultural heritage objects and wine tradition.
The main objective is supported with three specific objectives:
- To create new tourism destination,
- To improve offer of the cultural heritage destination and
- To ensure destination sustainability.
The expected results of the project are aligned to the indicators of the Cooperation Programme INTERREG V-A Slovenia – Croatia 2014.-2020. and are related to:
- Increase in the number of visitors of the cultural heritage objects (museums),
- Strengthened capacities of the key stakeholders and
- Development of the new tourism destination and comprehensive promotional campaign.
WORK PLAN
Implementation of the project has been divided among seven work packages with appropriately allocated activities and deadlines:
Duration
Activities
M – Management
08/2018–11/2020
M.1 Monitoring and drawing up of the reports
M.2 Partners’ meetings
C – Communication
08/2018–11/2020
C.1 Public events
C.2 Promotional material
C.3 Digital activities
C.4 Publications/publishing
C.5. Visual identity
T1 – Development of joint
tourism destination
11/2018–08/2019
T1.1 Methodology for consultative workshops with the stakeholders
T1.2 Consultative workshops with the Croatian and Slovenian stakeholders
T1.3 Plan of setting up the tourism destination
T2 – Improvement of the
museum offer
02/2019–08/2019
T2.1 The visitor monitoring system
T2.2 Workshops with the museums and digitalisation of the museum collection
T3 – Stakeholder capacity
strengthening
11/2019–03/2020
T3.1 Thematic education of the Croatian and Slovenian stakeholders
T4 – Promotion of the
tourism destination
03/2019–11/2020
T4.1 Central digitalised tourism destination catalogue
T4.2 Presentation of the tourism destination in the international tourism fair
T4.3 Promotional material for presenting the destination (tourism guides, monographics, promotional videos)
T4.4 Study tour for journalists and travel agencies
T4.5 Presentation of the new destination in cultural-amusement manifestations
T4.6 Installation of the tourism devices and „smart“ benches by the cultural heritage objects in Croatia
I1 – Infrastructure investment Slovenia
01/2019–11/2019
I1.1 Renovation of the wine house
I1.2 Installation of the tourism devices and „smart“ benches
TARGET GROUPS
The project will directly or indirectly encompass various target groups.
General public will be included through the activities of communication and promotion owing to which increase in the number of visitors in the cross-border area can be expected.
Local and regional government bodies will benefit from the project by developing new forms of cooperation and long-term increase in the economic activities in the cross-border area.
The project will include comprehensive educational activities with the aim to strengthen knowledge and skills about presenting the new tourism destination and to increase revenues of the key stakeholders in the long run. They will directly target professional associations in the sectors of culture, tourism and wine production, local entrepreneurs and artisans (e.g. wine producers, travel agencies, family farms) and indirectly other interest groups as well (educational institutions, sports and cultural associations etc.).
PARTNERS AND THE PROJECT AREA
The project will be implemented in the areas of Zagreb county (Croatia) and sub-regions of Obsotelje and Kozjansko (Slovenia). The project activities will be carried out with cooperation of the six project partners, out of which three are from Slovenia (Development Agency Sotla, Municipality of Šmarje pri Jelšah and Slovene Chamber of Agriculture and Forestry – Institute of Agriculture and Forestry Maribor and three from Croatia (Zagreb county, Association of Croatian travel agencies and Museum documentation center). Zagreb county has been appointed as the lead partner which holds the responsibility for the overall implementation of the project.
BUDGET AND THE PROJECT DURATION
The project is worth 1.003.317,00 euros.
Out of the total approved budget, 852.819,44 euros (85%) will be allocated from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) while the rest of 150.497,56 euros (15%) represents project partners’ financial contribution.
The budget will be spent during the 28-month long project duration (1 August 2018 – 30 November 2020).
MORE: https://inculturaveritas.eu/en
