One of the
very first activities of the Contemporary Old City Project in North Karelia,
Finland was to make an inventory of cultural and historical sites in the
region. Naturally, many already existing channels of touristic information were
used as sources of information. Furthermore, some materials produced by regional
authorities were utilised, too. For example, the Regional Land Use Plan (Regional
Council of North Karelia) offered detailed information about built cultural
environments as well as culturally and historically valuable buildings.
The
inventory work resulted in a list of 500 objects in North Karelia. The selected
approach to culture and history was wide, and objects related to handicraft, arts,
music, theatre, local history, history of businesses, history of
transportation, religion, galleries, food, statues and monuments, museums,
architecture, etc. were equally taken into account. All sites were listed,
firstly, by municipalities, and secondly, by thematic content. Only after this process
was it possible to describe the core content of our region’s history and
culture, and place the sites in this overall picture of culture tourism in our
region.
How will this
material be used in the development of culture tourism in North Karelia? The
inventory was exactly what was needed to produce background information for the
Culture Tourism section on the revamped VisitKarelia.fi website, which will be
launched on 16 Jan 2014 at the Nordic Travel Fair in Helsinki. Even before
decision on how to structure the Culture section in practice, it was found
extremely useful to benchmark how the same thing has been done elsewhere. For
example, the VisitEstonia website is an impressive example with interesting story-based
content and a strong thematic approach. For sure, we are not able to offer
tourism information in 14 languages as the Estonians currently do, but this
example was in many ways worthy of deeper familiarisation.
Tourism is
growing and the amount of Russian tourists has been increasing in Finland, including
North Karelia, South Karelia and the Helsinki area. There are also many
regions, for example, in Estonia and Latvia, which are now actively investing
in the development of culture tourism products and services in general, and for
the Russian market in particular. Why not exchange experiences and share
knowledge with tourism developers, who are facing similar challenges and
searching for feasible solutions? Personally, I was lucky to be among those
whose application to the Nordic-Baltic Mobility Programme of the Nordic Council
of Ministries was approved this year. The grant enabled one week’s study trip
to Tallinn, Riga and Cesis.
From the
study trip, I returned with a suitcase full of touristic materials, many new
contact details to be added to the network, plenty of new experiences to be shared
and a lot of new ideas to be implemented in our own ENPI project. In many
discussions with Estonian and Latvian colleagues, it was continuously emphasised
that the culture sector needs investments and development initiatives, even in
economically tough periods.
In many
regions the role of tourism in the regional economy is growing. At the same
time, the structure and volume of culture services are under political
discussion. How can a sufficient range of cultural services be maintained or
even improved in this complicated economic situation? In practice, how well can
the expectations of culture tourists be met at weekends, if, for example,
museums are closed on Saturdays and Sundays because of municipal budget cuts?
It is a question of strategic decisions, product and service development with
innovative solutions, intensified productisation, etc., and first and foremost,
a clear understanding of the importance of tourism for the regional economy and
importance of cultural content to the regional tourism offering.
Erja
Lehikoinen
Project
Manager, City of Joensuu
Contemporary
Old City: Enhancing Cultural Tourism across the Border
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