INTERREG-SUDOE Relight Project: Regional beacons for the promotion of sustainable tourism through culture

The transformation of cultural and natural heritage into sustainable tourism products represents an opportunity for the development of the SUDOE territory, particularly for inland rural areas with some common challenges: depopulation and aging, poor coordination between cultural and tourism agents, as well as imbalances between rural and urban areas, these being more noticeable in inland rural areas adjacent to coastal areas that concentrate tourism and cultural resources, generally disconnected from the rest of the territory.

RELIGHT proposes the activation of regional hubs that will serve as beacons for the development and experimentation of a systemic collaboration methodology. This methodology will reinforce the value of the cultural and natural heritage of rural inland areas, developing sustainable cultural tourism products that promote competitiveness at the regional and local levels. This will be achieved through: creating collaborative networks between public and private stakeholders in the cultural and tourism sectors; implementing co-created cultural actions in rural areas, balancing urban and rural spaces and generating sustainable tourism products; evaluating the collaborative methodology and its results, and developing policy recommendations; and promoting the adoption and transfer of the collaborative methodology.

As a result, the main beneficiaries will be: rural inland communities, increasing collaboration with urban areas and improving competitiveness; public authorities, integrating communities into policymaking and programming; the tourism sector, developing sustainable opportunities in its business models; and cultural entities, improving their connection with the local area and engaging with new audiences. RELIGHT's participatory approach offers an innovative solution that addresses cultural and tourism activities, which are usually disconnected, to create spaces where synergies can be identified and collaboration fostered.

In this context, transnational cooperation is essential to finding common solutions that consider specific territorial aspects and allow for replicability.