Presentation by Ivor Ambrose, Managing Director of ENAT, at the "Accessi Tourisme Simposium. Building Accessible Destinations", Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain.
Many Europeans with disabilities are unable to participate in important areas of society, simply because policies and the built environment are not designed to meet their requirements. Moreover, with the number of elderly people rapidly increasing, European societies will have to accommodate more and more disabled citizens in the future. This book invites member states to: promote full participation in community life by ensuring access to all areas of society, including the built environment, transport, products and goods, information, public service, education, employment and health care; implement Universal Design as a strategy to ensure equal and democratic rights in society for all individuals, regardless of age, abilities or cultural background, including persons with disabilities.
The Flash Eurobarometer 281 “Survey on the attitudes of Europeans towards tourism, Autumn 2009” was conducted at the request of Directorate General Enterprise and Industry to collect EU citizens’ views on travel, details of their (planned) holidays and travel in 2009 and their expectations regarding holidays in 2010. Special emphasis was put on the financial aspect of taking a holiday, as this is becoming a prime concern for both travellers and the tourism industry in the midst of the serious economic downturn affecting all EU economies.
The Study on the Competitiveness of the EU tourism industry - with specific focus on the accommodation and tour operator & travel agent industries - was commissioned by the Commission and run by Ecorys. Disclaimer : The views and propositions expressed in the study are those of the experts and do not necessarily represent any official view of the European Commission or any other organisations mentioned in the Report.
Within the framework of of the European Union's Operational Programme of Territorial Cooperation between Spain, France and Andorra 2007-2013 (Interreg IV A), the project Accessi Tourisme is a triennial project of cross-border cooperation on Accessible Tourism, between the Department of Turisme de Catalonia and its conterparts, the Departmental Committee of Eastern Pyrenees Tourism, and the Elsa Fundació NGO.
The ETCAATS project has two main aims: 1). to develop an online training course in accessible tourism from existing innovative content selected from previous Swedish work and supplemented with other international training materials; and 2). to develop a ‘Road map’ for an EU certification system for the area of accessible tourism vocational training, in line with the European Qualifications Framework. The target groups for the course include employers and personnel in the tourism industry.
The project aims to create new learning packages for on-line delivery, promote ’The Accessible City’ concept and improve the skills, knowledge and awareness of companies and employees associated with the tourism sector.
Participants from 15 Asian-Pacific countries adopted a declaration at a regional United Nations meeting in Japan, laying out 20 recommendations aimed at improving accessibility for persons with disabilities.
New figures released by VisitEngland from the UK Tourism Survey show that overnight trips made by, or accompanied by, someone with a health condition or impairment contributed almost £1bn to the English domestic visitor economy in the first 6 months of the year, accounting for 5.7 million trips in total.
At the 5th European Forum of Social Tourism, which took place in Malaga Spain, from 15 to 17 October, BITS – the International Bureau of Social Tourism and ENAT – the European Network for Accessible Tourism, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), with a view to establishing closer cooperation between the two associations.
ENAT is pleased to present this short video from the ENAT Congress, made by Dirk Janczewski. It features interviews with delegates and short clips from presentations, giving a flavour of the event.
