Moving tourism higher up the
EU agenda will provide the means
to achieve our targets and to raise
the profile of the tourism industry
across the EU and non-European
markets as well.
2. Extending the reach of European
tourism
Take, for example, Maramures, a region in the north of my own country, Romania, which offers beautiful
landscapes and unique food and
cultural traditions. While this region
has high tourist potential, public
transportation to the region and infrastructure within it are very poor.
Improving links and connectivity would contribute not only to the
economic and social development of
the region but also to the country as
a whole. There are many more regions across Europe with comparable tourist potential and comparable
problems. We must take more action to upgrade railway connections,
complete road and highway developments and introduce more directly
connected flights. As a Member of
the Committee on Transport and
Tourism, I am currently working on
addressing the issue of connectivity to remote areas and in my recent
work as the Socialist and Democrat
Rapporteur on the White Paper on
Transport, I emphasised the need to
give higher priority in EU policies
to better connectivity, particularly to
remote areas.
3. The skills shortage in the tourism
industry
...more efforts are
required to transform
tourism into a high
level educational
discipline
INSIDER SPECIAL EDITION
Tourism is also a means of reintegrating into the labour force both
unemployed young adults and parents looking for improved worklife balance. But more needs to be
done to address both the needs of
the industry and the social rights
of workers, particularly during
low seasons. We need to put more
funding and effort into supporting quality employment in order
to make the tourism sector more
attractive.
We also need to look at the needs of
the tourism industry and provide
high quality training opportunities. In this context more efforts are
required to transform tourism into
a high level educational discipline
within the social sciences. I would
propose the creation of a European
Academy for the training of workers in the tourism industry. Such
an institution will be essential for
the elimination of skills gaps and to
increase the relevance of vocational
training.
Besides involving 1.8 million businesses and providing 9.7 million
jobs, the tourism industry is one of
the few sectors which continues to
grow and to create thousands of jobs
in spite of the economic crisis: we
cannot ignore these figures.
In order to maintain the sector, we
need to ensure its visibility in the
daily policies defined by our institutions and national governments. We
need to ensure that access is provided
to all of Europe’s tourist destinations
in order to achieve the fulfilment of
Europe’s true tourist potential.
Last but not least, we need to guarantee a degree of human capital in
the sector, while taking into consideration the needs of the industry.
These three priorities will help set
in place the means to bring more
tourists into Europe while supporting the growth of our industry
and our economy.
I believe the best way for Europe to
tackle the challenges faced by the
tourism industry is through a change
of policy. We need to replace the outdated 2010 Communication on European tourism with a new approach.
While I welcome the eight common actions to foster the European tourism industry outlined
by Commissioner Bienkowska in
her speech in Madrid earlier this
year, I also believe that the right
way forward is with a renewal and
update of the Commission strategy
on tourism. The 2010 document
does not represent the changes brought forward by the digital
agenda or the sharing economy.
It does not take into account EU
enlargement or growing competition with non-European markets.
We need a comprehensive strategy
coming from the top to deal with
these challenges and to transform
them into opportunities.
The Hon. Claudia Tapardel
is a Romanian member of the European
Parliament, member of the Committee
on Transport and Tourism, and co-chair
of the Parliamentary Intergroup on
European Tourism Development and
Cultural Heritage.
2015
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