What is smart tourism?
In a nutshell, smart tourism embraces innovative, digital and eco-savvy approaches to travel. From regulating the flow of travellers and supporting diverse communities to making the most of virtual reality and using the latest technology to break down language barriers, it responds to old and new demands in a fast-changing industry. As hotbeds of creativity and social activity, smart tourism destinations devise solutions that benefit locals while enhancing the visitor experience. In the EU, where tourism is the third-largest socioeconomic activity, making up around 10% of the economy, several cities are ahead of the curve.
Promoting smart tourism across Europe
The European Capital of Smart Tourism initiative aims to kick-start a conversation about smart tourism by applauding forward-thinking destinations. For the past two years, it’s defined smart tourism excellence across four categories: accessibility; sustainability; digitalisation; and cultural heritage and creativity. Rather than acting strictly as a contest, the goal of this EU-wide competition — developed in 2018 by the European Union and implemented by the European Commission — is to take examples from leading smart tourism destinations and provide a platform for other cities to discover those ideas, all the while fostering cooperation. Its Compendium of Best Practices is exactly that: chock-full of success stories, the free-to-access guide to smart tourism details everything from reusable coffee cups in Karlsruhe and smart waste management in Ljubljana to forward-thinking digital initiatives, such as Helsinki’s WeChat programme, designed for Chinese tourists. In 2020, Gothenburg and Málaga were both lauded for redefining their tourism offers.
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