La Rete delle Aree Protette Alpine
Last December, Xavier Eudes has replaced Eva Alicar at the head of the Vanoise National park (FR) while Dr. Tit Potočnik has been recently appointed as new director of the Triglav National Park (SL). In Switzerland, Moritz Clausen will fill up the vacant position of managing director of the Binntal Nature Park on the 1st of March 2022. On the very same day, Massimo Bocca will retire after years of dedicated work as director of the Mont Avic natural park (IT).
Before joining the Vanoise National Park, Xavier Eudes was deputy director of the Department of Territories and the Sea of the Hérault. For 6 years, he developed projects for economic actors and local authorities in rural areas, by promoting the identity of these areas and in relation to the preservation of agricultural, natural and forestry land.
With a concern for dialogue and consultation both internally, with the Park's teams, and with the partners and inhabitants of the Vanoise, he is committed to "working together" and the co-construction of projects to enhance the territory. As a practitioner of outdoor activities, he is also committed to opening up the Park to the various publics, which is essential in view of the current challenges of biodiversity, and associated with controlled tourism development.
Dr. Tit Potočnik was appointed as a director by the Slovenian Government at its regular meeting on 20th January 2022. He has been appointed for a limited mandate of 4 years (from 27th January 2022 up to 26th January 2026) with the possibility of reappointment.
Dr Tit Potočnik obtained his Bachelor of Laws degree in October 2003, his Master of Laws degree in EU Commercial Law from the Faculty of Law of the University of Maribor in June 2006 and his Doctor of Laws degree in EU Commercial Law from the International University of Novi Pazar in October 2009. Since September 2010, he has worked in various managerial positions, mainly as a director of limited liability companies.
The board of the Binntal Landscape Park has appointed Moritz Clausen as its new managing director. The federally certified accountant from Ernen will take up his post on 1 March 2022.
Moritz Clausen, who grew up in Ernen, is a federally certified accountant. After his training and intensive professional years in Bern, he returned to the Valais and to Ernen in 2019. Since then, he has been working as a client manager for a fiduciary and auditing company in Brig. In his previous professional positions, he has worked in various teams and also gained some experience in team leadership. "Moritz Clausen brings a lot of experience with him, especially in project work. Thanks to his knowledge and his identification with the region, he will be able to represent the Binntal Landscape Park in the best possible way", says Moritz Schwery, President of the Binntal Landscape Park.
Moritz Clausen has known the Binntal Landscape Park since its foundation. He is convinced of its charisma and knows the different demands and wishes. "I am pleased that I will henceforth be able to play an active and creative role for my home region," says Moritz Clausen about his future commitment. Moritz Clausen wants to lead the Binntal Landscape Park into the future together with the existing team and develop it further in accordance with its goals.
In the context of the Healing Alps – HEALPS2 project, several tools are being developed to facilitate the development of health tourism value chains in different Alpine regions. Destination managers need concrete instruments to determine the healing potential of their region and match it with the needs of potential visitors. The scenario tool is an innovative platform which helps to identify the healing profile of a specific region and developing nature-based health tourism offers in line with customers preferences and needs. Enjoy the video!
The Reading Mountains Festival is a way to connect people that love books and mountains, despite them being physically apart. Book lovers and authors, mountaineers and artists throughout the Alps (and beyond) have a chance to discuss similar issues and evaluate the meaning, impact, and purpose of Alpine literature.
In the lead up to International Mountain Day 2021, the #ReadingMountains Festival will once again pay tribute to the linguistic and cultural heritage in the Alps. This year too, there can be no limits to the creativity of events in the Alpine-wide festival, which can take place online, in-person, or in hybrid form. Registration to organize an event for the 2021 edition goes through the dedicated online form. The Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention will support the promotion of events through social media as well as with posters, bookmarks, and other promotional materials. Only events registered by 30 November 2021 will be guaranteed promotional materials.
The award is a new competition to support Green Economy in the Alpine Macroregion. The competition is an initiative of the EU Strategy for the Alpine Region (EUSALP), financially supported by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation and operated by PLANVAL.
EUSALP is looking for innovative and sustainable ideas, products, services and business models in the Alpine Region. Everyone from the Alpine Region can participate in the competition: start-ups, long-established companies, institutions, associations, private persons or teams. An international jury will select 6 winners.
Proposals can be submitted until 15 January 2022! Participation is easy. Applicants just have to enter the official website and fill in the short application form.
More information at www.gi-goes-business.eu.
The global pandemic saw school closures in over 180 countries. Many protected areas had to cancel or downsize their education activities outdoor over several weeks and months. However, Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is crucial to be maintained as it can help to build resilience, raise awareness, and change behavior to transform our lives towards more sustainable patterns. Even though many activities outside could not be performed as before, several protected areas found new approaches for implementing activities even digitally. In the present survey we wanted to gain an overview on how the protected areas dealt with the challenge and adapted their activities according to national regulations.
250 guests, twelve speakers from five countries, a common vision: last October Bad Hofgastein was the venue for the fourth international symposium Healing Power of the Alps, this year for the first time spanning the Alps. The topic: How to use the healing power of the Alps to redefine sustainable tourism. Representatives of international initiatives from across the Alpine region met in Bad Hofgastein to discuss this new approach to tourism. “The overall goal is to position the Alpine region as a globally attractive health destination with a vibrant regional economy, especially after the pandemic,” said Salzburg State Minister Daniela Gutschi at the opening of the symposium. She continued, “The wealth of the Alpine region lies in its healing power.”
Since the times of the Roman empire, thermal waters being one of the Alpine healing resources have been used and recommended for nurturing body and soul. Nowadays an ever-increasing part of the population is interested in innovative touristic services for health and wellbeing, for keeping themselves vital and active. The Private Medical University Paracelsus of Salzburg is a forerunner regarding evidence-based research on different Alpine healing resources such as waterfalls, microbioma or dairy products. For example, Asthma in patients could be significantly reduced after repeated stays close to specific waterfalls. Moreover, clinical studies found a positive correlation between a holiday stay in the Alps and the relationship quality for couples aged between 50 and 65 years. These are just some concrete findings which hold substantial potential for Alpine regions to unfold their hidden healing power and developing new touristic products. In this sense even remote regions suffering from brain drain and low economic power might be able to develop new local value chains, valorizing their region and leading to vital businesses while promoting also resilience of Alpine resources and the soundness of ecological systems.
Top-class speakers such as Prof. Dr. Christian Baumgartner and Franz Fischler, President of the European Forum Alpbach and former EU Agriculture Commissioner provided interesting insights on the development of tourism in the Alps and the different notions associated to sustainable development. Several stakeholder workshops on different topics such as agriculture and farms, forests under guidance of Prof. Robert Lymann, Julia Saller, Dr. Michael Bischof and many others allowed for discussion and in-depth exchange in smaller groups.
“Healing Power of the Alps” was part of a series of events in the framework of the Alpine Convention dedicated to sustainable Alpine tourism and was organised in cooperation with ArgeAlp. More information can be found on the official website: https://healing-alps.eu
PHOTO: © Agentur Salic David Wedenig
This colorful publication gathers 26 local recipes from all over the Alps and the Carpathians and it includes drawings made by the young people who took part in Youth at the Top 2021. Each recipe is described in the 4 Alpine languages + English.
The event "Leaving small traces on the way – a virtual afternoon hike to selected examples of visitor guidance in the Alps" is addressed to the 4 pilot regions from the "speciAlps2" project as well as interested parties from the entire Alpine region. It is co-organise by CIPRA internal and Alliance in the Alps. The event aims to share good examples, experiences and grievances as well as inspire all participants and discuss together a selection of possibilities to guide visitors in the Alps. Therefore, all participants are invited to bring in personal examples on the topic of "visitor management". In this context, ALPARC will present the alpine project "Be Part of the Mountain" (see programme below).
The public exchange meeting will take place online and will be interpreted simultaneously in the four different Alpine languages.
On 7 November 1991 the leaders of the Alpine countries sat down to sign a pioneering agreement for the protection and sustainable development of the Alps: the Alpine Convention. This created a unique, legally binding sustainability instrument aimed at safeguarding the sensitive Alpine ecosystems, the regional cultural identities and heritage in the Alps now and for the future. On the occasion of the 30th anniversary, a celebratory video was produced with contributions from the Ministers and delegates from the Contracting Parties, Observer organisations, Infopoints and many other valuable partners from across the Alpine region. Kind and inspiring messages arrived from past and present members of the Alpine Convention family – these can be watched in the anniversary video.
In addition to this look back, the Permanent Committee also looks ahead to the future – with the launch of the new Alpine Convention video. Through beautiful and captivating scenery and a symphonic soundtrack composed specially for the video, the film introduces the Alpine Convention and the important work it does in the Alpine region. The new video is available on the YouTube channel of the Alpine Convention.
The 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference has been launched on Monday, November 1 in Glasgow (United Kingdom), in the presence of many heads of state. In the worrying climate context pointed out by the IPCC last August, the objective of this annual conference is to assess progress in dealing with climate change, and to establish legally binding obligations for developed countries to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. The event takes the form of a series of Conferences of the Parties (COP).
Under the Paris Agreement adopted at the COP21, countries submitted pledges called nationally determined contributions, to limit their greenhouse gas emissions. Under the framework of the Paris Agreement, each country is expected to submit enhanced nationally determined contributions every five years, to ratchet up ambition to mitigate climate change. The COP26 is the first time that parties are expected to commit to enhanced ambition since COP21. Ahead of the Conference, G20 leaders met in Rome the previous weekend and reaffirmed in unison the goal of limiting warming to +1.5°C above the pre-industrial era - the most ambitious cap in the Paris agreement - adding an ambition of carbon neutrality around mid-century and an end to subsidies for coal plants abroad.
UNESCO Biosphäre Entlebuch is running a new exhibition on sustainable provision of life quality in the Entlebuch UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, until March 2022.
What constitutes a high quality of life? What aspects are important for a high quality of life? And how can a high quality of life and sustainability be reconciled?
The exhibition "We love Äntlibuech" deals with these questions and focuses on the Entlebuch and its inhabitants. The exhibition is based on the research project "Sustainable quality of life in parks of national importance" by the University of Bern. This showed that the average quality of life in the Entlebuch is very high - even higher than in other regions of Switzerland. The research results serve as the basis for a search for clues: Why is the quality of life in the Entlebuch particularly high? Which aspects of life make the quality of life particularly high? And what about the sustainability of this high quality of life: can our grandchildren still enjoy the same high quality of life - or are we living beyond our means?
The exhibition will not provide definitive answers. It is intended to encourage visitors to think about their own quality of life: What makes it so? How long will it last? How satisfied am I with important aspects? So it is also about taking a critical look at one's own life. Here and there, the exhibition will offer ways and alternatives to well-rehearsed patterns of life that suit some, but not others. The aim of the exhibition is to become aware of the various aspects of one's own quality of life and to dare to take a step here and there towards a more sustainable quality of life.
Landscape in Switzerland is under continuous pressure due to demographic change, mobility, intensive agriculture and tourism growth. Endangered species amount for 36% of the assessed plant animal and fungus species. Consequently, the Swiss tourism branche should have a resource protecting attitude towards landscape. Discussions regarding protection and long term use of scarce resources need to be objective and on a high quality level. However, large parts of the tourism branche still perceive the conservation of landscape quality as an obstacle to development, limiting the region’s potential. The Corona pandemic led to an breaking of global tourist flows and high-quality inland tourism might become highly important for Swiss tourism providers. Hence, the promotion of landscapes’ attractiveness must be understood as an impulse measure for stimulating Swiss tourism on different levels. The study, commissioned by the Federal Office for the Environment and conducted by Schmid Pelli & Partner, aims at delivering a constructive input for the cooperation among landscape experts and tourism stakeholders in order to increase consciousness on the quality of landscape as a change and development potential for Swiss tourism.