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.
The EU funded MEDIATE project aims to establish a common European methodology for measuring accessibility to public transport. In order to create a good practice guide, towns and cities are asked to fill in a questionnaire if they believe that they have examples of good practice. The data they provide will form the basis of the Guide.
Argonautical Park, the first modern sailing centre in the Region of Magnesia, Greece offers accessible accommodation, restaurant, training and education camps for Greek and International visitors of all ages and abilities. The management is now searching for a business partner to continue the development of this unique facility.
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.
Over 30 of the presentations and speeches given at the 2nd ENAT International Congress in Vienna are now available for downloading. They include keynote addresses, workshop reports and case studies from many countries on a variety of subjects.
In conjunction with the ENAT 2nd International Conference on accessible tourism, the Global Alliance on Accessible Technologies and Environments (GAATES) presented Mr. Mohammed Tarawneh Chair of the UN Committee on the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities with a special GAATES Award of Recognition in honour of his outstanding leadership and dedication to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Representatives of ENAT, KAZUIST, TRIANON met in the ENAT office (the seat of EWORX S.A.) on 2nd July 2009. The meeting, which took place over two days consisted of project preparations, networking between Greek and Czech organisations and excursions to accessible tourism sites.
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 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.
