1 FINAL HANDBOOK 31 THE WAY FORWARD Working with the UST project has strengthened our belief that place-based development through tourism is the right path forward—and that we are on the right track. As a next step, this will be more clearly reflected in our renewed cooperation agreement with Visit Hornborgasjön, where place development through tourism will take a more central role. We will actively work to build networks that ensure the voices and engagement of local residents are part of our place development process. One initiative we are planning is an annual workshop that brings together actors across administrative boundaries, where we can share knowledge, learn about each other’s work, and explore new ways to collaborate. In addition, we aim to organize an annual bus tour for local politicians to experience firsthand how we are working on sustainability at the destination level. Our ambition is to continue to be a source of inspiration and to take the lead in demonstrating how to develop a place where everyone thrives—local residents, businesses, nature, wildlife, and visitors alike. 1 svedest We have run the self-assessment tool and the training modules for municipal staff and as a part of a vocational training course and seen the benefits of doing sustainability policy as a group effort, combining different perspectives and skill sets to create a whole. WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED FROM APPLYING THE TOOLS OURSELVES – REFLECTIONS FROM RUNNING THE WORKSHOPS Our key learnings are from working with the partners on creating and prototyping the selfassessment tool and e-learning platform. There are so many different perspectives and takes on sustainability and whether tourism can be a source of good, or is a necessary evil to be managed. It has become clear that as long as local community is involved and there is a clear benefit to local society then tourism definitely plays a part in creating resilient societies that cares for local heritage through culture, nature, gastronomy and traditions. A lot of the key takeaways from working with large stakeholder groups together with the partners shows that the SDGs seem far away from the local situation – especially on an individual level. There are always policies in place to handle municipal high level goals directed to the realisation of the SDGs but no real way of connecting it to a broad set of community stakeholders that make the SDGs matter for daily life. This disconnect may make local stakeholders feel that the issues around sustainability is someone else’s and this can make them feel powerless and deflated. It turns out that when you start to construct a definition of the SDGs in a local tourism context you also uncover a lot of good practices, all grounded in grass roots movements, associations and small scale entrepreneurs. These good practices can been seen as isolated things, but once you start to place them side by side a tapestry of actions appear, most of which have a substantial bearing on promoting sustainable tourism linked to resilient and sustainable municipal government.
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