Maybe this statement is not really clear at first glance. When this Club was first created, individual businesses started to join in; over time and after several group meetings, training activities and promotion actions, these start to meet other members of the Club. The goal is to create a positive synergy so that different businesses can create their own tourism products while everybody benefits from this association.
But we do not want to do just that; we want to go a step further. All the businesses of the Tourism Product Club of Lanzarote’s Biosphere Reserve can be promoted on the website www.soyecoturista.com or free thanks to the membership of Lanzarote’s Biosphere Reserve Office in TUREBE. This way, we can cover part of the online promotion at a national level, but what about the regional level? The offer is atomised and this is not a good thing to achieve great things. Therefore, and following this Club’s objectives, we attended a meeting to present Activa Canarias, a regional association of Turismo Activo (Active Tourism), with a presence in the national tables of tourism of the Central Government.
Activa Canarias’ intention is to achieve the recognition of Active Tourism destinations, and this cannot be achieved individually, but with the combined effort of different entities: for example, by joining together our training sessions and the programmes they offer to achieve the new guidelines of Active Tourism, or by trying to group the offer of Active Tourism to manage to create a single voice that can achieve more things for everyone. We are trying to create a new image and label, an emblem of quality, guarantee and sustainability endorsed by all the entrepreneurs that make up the board of members.
On Friday, the 14th of October, we attended a meeting/presentation by Activa Canarias in Lanzarote. We will now share their statement with you:
The Association and the Island Council are taking care of Lanzarote’s Active Tourism. Activa Canarias follows its route throughout the Canary Islands.
Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 17th of October, 2016. This Friday, 14th of October, the board of directors of the Association of Active Tourism Businesses, Activa Canarias, met with institutions and entrepreneurs of the sector in Lanzarote.
In the morning, the president and the manager of Activa Canarias, José Luis Echevarría and Tanausú Zumaquero-Nuez respectively, met with the Tourism Councillor of Lanzarote’s Island Council, Echedey Eugenio, and with the Managing Director of the Society of Foreign Promotion of Lanzarote (SPEL), Héctor Fernández.
The representatives of the agents of Active Tourism in the Canary Islands are looking for a regulatory framework that allows to develop the activity in a sustainable way, unlike the current framework, which is ambiguous enough that allows for the existence of certain local rules that limit the entrepreneurship of Active Tourism.
For example: In Lanzarote, hiking trails are being reduced despite the fact that the demand for it is growing, which emphasises the difference of the Canary Islands as a destination and a tourism product. Similarly, in La Graciosa, Active Tourism businesses that follow the regulations are being taxed, while clubs and association outside of the professional legal framework develop their activities without being controlled. This results in unfair competition, loss of local employment, and damages to the environment, all of which are values opposed to the ones followed by the members of Activa Canarias.
Both Councillors expressed their empathy and concern regarding this situation, and guaranteed their involvement by looking into a solution alongside Activa Canarias, giving the association a presence in the Society of Foreign Promotion of Lanzarote and studying the possibility of giving their own reference brand to the Active Tourism inside the Island Product Club.
In the evening, the president, the manager and the representative of the Association in the island, Marcelo Espino Cabello, met with the businesses of Active Tourism in the island to learn about their situation and their demands for improvement. José Luis Echevarría defended the union of the agents of Active Tourism to create a strong tourism product, to strengthen in the face of the administration and to give the client the best service possible. Just in 2015, the Active Tourism in the Archipelago drew almost 1,150,000 visitors and generated more than 1,400 million Euros, surpassing the 10% turnover of tourism in the Canary Islands.
Get to know Activa Canarias a little more:
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