E-News July: Three important Charter Meetings

For the European Charter Network June was a month of networking, exchanging of experience and decision making at three important and successful meetings and also saw the launch of the Charters brand new website. The biggest event took place in Capileira, Spain, where over 140 people from all over Europe came together for the 6th annual European Charter Network Meeting. In addition, an information seminar on the Charter for countries in Central/Eastern Europe was organised in Slovakia in mid-June and last but not leasty, the European Charter Evaluation Committee came together to decide on this year’s Charter applications.

6th Annual Charter Network Meeting

The annual European Charter Meeting is the most important networking activity for Charter Areas, Charter Candidates, Charter Partner businesses and other interested protected areas or organisations. It is a platform for all people involved in the Charter Network to exchange experiences and know-how and to find out how the Charter is implemented in other areas and countries. This year this lively meeting took place in Capileira, in the natural area of Sierra Nevada in Spain, in the middle of the Alpujarra Mountains.

140 participants from all the countries involved in the Charter Network joined the plenary and working group sessions that were filled with interesting presentations and intensive discussions on the various parts of the European Charter, e.g. the implementation of Charter Part II, experience about re-evaluation, how to start the Charter process etc. For the first time a notable number of local tourism businesses as well as tour operators were represented and actively participating in discussions.

The dialogue in the working groups led to a series of conclusions and recommendations which were put together in a final report that can be found on the EUROPARC Charter Website. Of course, there was also time to enjoy the beautiful landscape of the Sierra Nevada. Three excursions were organised, the climbing of the Mulhacen for the advanced adventurers, a hike on the newly opened long distance track Sulayr (Arabic for “mountains of the sun”) and a bus tour visiting local Charter Partners.

Enlarging the Charter Network to new countries

Around 30 participants followed the invitation from the EUROPARC Federation to an Information Seminar on the European Charter on the 15th of June in Pezinok, Slovakia. Everybody was curious to find out more about the Charter and the process behind it. During the one day seminar with a plenary session in the morning and working group discussions in the afternoon, this goal was achieved.

The aim of the seminar was to enlarge the existing Charter Network to new countries in Eastern and Central Europe. The seminar took place in the framework of the EUROPARC project European CharterNet which is supported by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN) with funds from the German Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety. The Seminar was moderated by the EUROPARC Federation in cooperation with Zuzana Okanikova from the State Nature Conservancy of the Slovak Republic. The presentations were prepared by the Charter experts and participants of the project working group of the European CharterNet.
More information

17 new Charter Areas and three re-evaluations

From the 26-27 of June the EUROPARC Evaluation Committee for the European Charter met in Brussels, Belgium to discuss and decide about 17 new Charter applications from six European countries and three re-evaluations. All applications were accepted by the Committee and the successful parks will receive and sign their Charter certificate during the official ceremony at the EUROPARC Conference 2009 on the 12th of September in Strömstad, Sweden. The EUROPARC Federation would like to congratulate all the protected areas and express its appreciation of the excellent work that they have realised in the field of sustainable tourism management.

New Charter Website is launched!

We are happy inform you about the launch of the new EUROPARC European Charter website www.european-charter.org. After an intensive time of planning and programming, the site has finally been launched. Keeping in style with the new Federation website we have gone for a similar design and feel and hope that you like it. The website was realised with the support of the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation with funds from the German Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety in the framework of the EUROPARC project “European CharterNet”.
But the work still goes on and we ask you to bear with us during the process of refining and updating the website. Please advise us if you feel that information is missing or incorrect, links do not work etc.
So far, the website is only available in English language. The information for the other languages will be put in step by step and will be made available in the course of the next 2-3 months.