“Ski the Balkans”. You won’t be seeing that bumper sticker in the near future, but you may hear or read about a resurgent tourism industry in Kosovo. Other “ex Yugoslavia” countries are carrying on effective campaigns to capitalize on the international tourism market. Part of their success is due to the natural draw of the geography and culture. Croatia and Montenegro, for instance, have the most beautiful coast line in Europe, and combined with Old World architectural themes and a developed tourism infrastructure, those countries are benefitting from  an influx of tourists spending big Euros.

 

Bresovica base lodge

I was recently in Kosovo as part of our CityLinks component for a USAID program. We’re working with Golden, Colorado (Mike Bestor, CM) to improve the downtown livability of four communities, and also to improve the tourism promotion efforts of four other municipalities. Golden’s Economic Development Director Steve Glueck and I traveled to those municipalities to help them form and start to execute action plans for bringing in local, and some international, tourists, and to increase the average length of stay.  In other words, we are trying to help the municipalities become tourist destinations rather than day trip stops.

The key to tourism development, according to experts like Steve, is to have a concerted promotion program which emphasizes a close working relationship among the local government, the local hospitality and commercial interests, and the travel industry. In addition to the need for local government as the facilitator of the tourism improvement process, it is crucial that the local government provide for the infrastructure to serve visitor needs and to motivate them to return. This of course means that the local government needs to adopt tourism as a major economic goal, and to back up that commitment with public works funds and new sources of revenue such as a locally collected and retained hotel room occupancy tax.

Steve will continue with his CityLinks tourism effort in a very hands-on manner, and he will supplement his onsite mentoring with emailed “how to” information on managing visitor centers, and also on branding of tourism areas. Some areas are known by names from more than one ethnic group, and making everyone happy with a name is a real challenge.  He will also work with agricultural and artisanal groups to promote local products for visitors to stock up on and take back to their home communities. I’ll keep you posted as Steve makes progress. Meanwhile you can check out the Kosovo skiing scene by going to http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=kosovo+bresovica&qpvt=kosovo+bresovica&FORM=IGRE