Alpine Pearls celebrates its 18th anniversary
Alpine Pearls is celebrating an important anniversary: the organisation was founded exactly 18 years ago. As a pioneering organisation that emerged from EU-funded projects on the subject of environmentally friendly mobility, Alpine Pearls has made a significant contribution to establishing car-free holiday offers in the Alps. A lot has happened since 2006...
The aim of Alpine Pearls is still to support the member destinations in the area of environmentally friendly tourism and mobility offers and to pay attention to the three aspects of sustainability - ecological, economic and social. At the same time, Alpine Pearls serves as a platform and community to overcome challenges, which are often of a similar nature across countries, together and to continuously develop further.
The Alpine Pearls' main topic, environmentally friendly mobility, is more topical than ever. New solutions are needed here, but also courageous municipalities and destinations that want to break new ground and bring theory and practice together.
Wide range of offers for sustainable mobility
At its core, all Alpine Pearls activities continue to pursue the goal of sustainable tourist mobility, which covers both the journey to and from the destination as well as the so-called "last mile" on site. The focus here is on public transport and is supplemented by additional offers such as transfer services.
Broad focus on sustainable development
In addition to transnational cooperation and the topic of mobility, Alpine Pearls is also committed to sustainable development in Alpine tourism in other areas. Topics such as governance, youth participation and sustainable energy are examples of this. In order to provide its members with the best possible support, the EGTC Alpine Pearls offers four key areas:
- Platform & Network: a strong community and a network that promotes exchange and cooperation.
- Knowledge & Development: Ongoing training and knowledge transfer to support sustainable practices.
- Projects & Financing: Support in the planning and financing of sustainable projects.
- Communication & Marketing: Efficient communication strategies to promote common goals and projects.
Structural transformation into an EGTC
In 2022, Alpine Pearls switched from the form of an association to the legal form of an EGTC (European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation). This transformation opens up new development opportunities and enables more intensive cooperation across borders. In particular, the implementation of and participation in EU-funded projects is improved, which contributes to the transnational networking and positioning of Alpine Pearls' priority topics.
Advantages of the EGTC structure
The member locations benefit from new collaborations as well as from findings and analyses from pilot activities. Alpine Pearls also plays an active role in a wide range of topics and thus promotes sustainable development in the Alpine regions.