MED Sustainable Tourism community

Created in November 2016 within the framework of the Interreg MED Programme under the name of BleuTourMed, the MED Sustainable Tourism Community has been renewed for a three-year period until June 2022 to make tourism a real driver for inclusive and sustainable growth.

Since 2019, five new territorial cooperation projects (LABELSCAPE SuSTowns, WINTER MED, INCIRCLE and DESTIMED PLUS) have joined the Community that now gathers 22 projects co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), almost 300 organisations (public authorities, private companies, universities, NGOs and international organisations) active in 12 European-Mediterranean coastal areas. Besides, two Strategic Projects, approved in October 2019, focusing on governance of sustainable tourism will join forces with the Community.

Most notably, the Community’s members are leading the development of innovative tools to monitor the tourism industry, they are studying and testing new tourism models and they are actively engaging policy makers and managers in a constant dialogue to make tourism a real driver for inclusive and sustainable development.

Plan Bleu is partner of the MED Sustainable Tourism Community.

Project Partners

The MED Sustainable Tourism community is coordinated by DIBA – Barcelona Provincial Council (Spain), in partnership with UNIMED – Mediterranean Universities Union (Italy),University of Thessaly (Greece), NECSTour – Network of European Regions or Sustainable and Competitive Tourism (Belgium), Arco Latino – network of local public authorities (Spain), Plan Bleu – UNEP/MAP Regional Activity Centre (France), Adriatic and Ionian Euroregion (Croatia) and RDA Green Karst – Regional Development Agency (Slovenia).

Associated Partners

• Association MedCities (Spain)
• Conference of Peripheral
• Maritime Regions of Europe – CPMR (France)
• European Tourism Association – ETOA (UK)
• International Union for the Conservation of
• Nature – Mediterranean Centre (Spain)
• Mediterranean experience of Ecotourism
• Network – MEET Network (Spain)
• Observatory on Tourism in the European
• Islands – OTIE (Italy)
• National Research Council – Earth system
• science and environmental technologies
• Department (Italy)
• Association of Mediterranean Chambers of
• Commerce and Industry – ASCAME (Spain)
• Central Europe Initiative (CEI) – Executive
• Secretariat (Italy)
• University of Jordan (Jordan)
• University of the Aegean – Research Unit (Greece)
• Cyprus University of Technology
• Eratosthenes Research Centre Department of
• Civil Engineering and Geomatics (Cyprus)
• Forum of Adriatic and Ionian Chamber of Commerce (Italy)

Events

The kick-off meeting of the phase 2 of the MED Sustainable Tourism Community will be held in Salou, Tarragona (Spain), on 2-6 March 2020.

Plan Bleu is also involved in 2 other projects of the Interreg Med Programme 2019-2022:

• Biodiversity Protection Community
• Blue Growth Community

Projects of the Community:

• ALTER ECO: Alternative tourist strategies to enhance the local sustainable development of tourism by promoting Mediterranean Identity.
• BLUEISLANDS: Seasonal variation of waste as effect of tourism.
• BLUEMED: Plan/test/coordinate Underwater Museums, Diving Parks and Knowledge Awareness Centres in order to support sustainable and responsible tourism development and promote Blue growth in coastal areas and islands of the Mediterranean.
• CASTWATER: Coastal areas sustainable tourism water management in the Mediterranean.
• COASTING: Defining a common methodology for integrated coastal tourism using ICZM, coastal contracts and bay contracts.
• CO-EVOLVE: Promoting the co-evolution of human activities and natural systems for the development of sustainable coastal and maritime tourism.
• CONSUME-LESS: Consume Less in Mediterranean Touristic Communities.
• DestiMED: Mediterranean Ecotourism Destination: main components (joint planning, monitoring, management and promotion) for a governance system in Mediterranean protected areas.
• EMbleMatiC: Emblematic Mediterranean Mountains as Coastal destinations of excellence.
• HERIT DATA: Sustainable Heritage Management towards Mass Tourism Impact thanks to a holistic use of Big and Open Data
• INHERIT: Natural heritage tourism for the Mediterranean coastal and maritime areas.
• MEDCYCLETOUR: MEDiterranean CYcle route for sustainable coastal
  TOURism. MEDFEST: MED Culinary heritage experiences: how to create sustainable tourist destinations.
• MITOMED+: Models of Integrated Tourism in the MEDiterranean.
• ShapeTourism: New shape and drives for the tourism sector: supporting decision, integrating plans and ensuring sustainability.
• SIROCCO: Sustainable InterRegional cOastal & Cruise maritime tourism through Cooperation and joint planning
• TOURISMED: Tourism fisheries towards a sustainable development in the Mediterranean Region.
• LABELSCAPE
• SuSTowns
• WINTER MED
• INCIRCLE
• DESTIMED PLUS