Following the official project launch, USAID Turizam organized a webinar featuring speakers from organizations such as the UN World Tourism Organization, World Bank Group, TripAdvisor, Tourism Economics, MMGY, E-Tourism Frontiers, Black Mountain, Global Travel & Tourism Resilience Council, Travel Weekly and many others
On Monday, 24 January 2021, Eric Nelson, US Ambassador to BiH and Nancy Eslick, USAID/BiH Mission Director officially presented USAID’s new Developing Sustainable Tourism in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Turizam) project. The online event also featured Staša Košarac, BiH Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation, Edita Đapo, FBiH Minister of Environment and Tourism and Suzana Gašić, RS Minister of Trade and Tourism.
Following the official project launch, USAID Turizam organized a two-day webinar entitled Driving Tourism Recovery and Resilience in Bosnia and Herzegovina, featuring a series of international speakers from organizations such as the UN World Tour-ism Organization, World Bank Group, TripAdvisor, Tourism Economics, MMGY, E-Tourism Frontiers, Black Mountain, Global Travel & Tourism Resilience Council, Travel Weekly and many others, as well as representatives of domestic institutions such as the BiH Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Relations, Tourism Association of Canton Sarajevo, Tourist Organization of Republika Srpska, RS Ministry of Trade and Tourism, FBiH Ministry of Environment of Tourism, Government of Brčko District and others.
The live broadcast of the online event was followed by around 1,000 viewers on both days, while the recordings of the event subsequently posted on Facebook had over 60,000 views in total. As witnessed by numerous comments left on our social media channels, the webinar was well received by the BiH tourism industry and wider audience, providing a sense of optimism and direction in times of great uncertainty caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. As the webinar speakers confirmed, post COVID-19 traveler motivations will strongly align with healthier travel options, including nature and adventure, all strengths for BiH. Properly conserved, developed with innovation and effectively marketed, sustainable tourism can fuel broad-based economic growth across the tourism and related value chains, including agriculture.
