How to combine history, art, culture and entrepreneurship?
The answer was givent on May 14-15 by participants of the practical seminar “The role of small and medium-sized businesses in the development of tourist routes in the Poltava region”.
The event was organized by the NGO “Council of Young Scientists” within the framework of the EU4Business initiative aimed at developing small and medium-sized businesses in Ukraine, with a grant from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. The seminar was held at Poltava University of Economics and Trade.
The main purpose of the event was to motivate entrepreners to participate in the tourism industry, aimed at the effective use of green, eco- and agro-tourism opportunities in the Poltava region.
The speakers of the event:
• Olga Gerasimyuk, Curator of the School of Lokhvytsky Zemstvo;
• Yanina Barybina, expert in the development of tourist destinations, co-founder of the International Festival “Poltava Dumpling”;
• Timur Khalilov, an analyst at the EBRD Small and Medium Business Group.
The practical part of the seminar was devoted to the experience and development of skills in organizing tourist routes. The trainers included Serhiy Podmogilny, coordinator of the development of the Green Roads network and Alexander Bursanov, chairman of the NGO “Carpathian Trails”.
On the next day, the experts on the marking of tourist sites organized a trip along the routes of the “School of Lokhvytsky Zemstvo”: to Udaisky Piski, where experts inspected tourist sites of Ukrainian modernity and made conclusions about the possibilities of creating and developing SMEs along this route.
The seminar was attended both by representatives of the tourist business of Poltava region and entrepreneurs from Sumy: heads of travel agencies, centers of green tourism of the Sumy region, organizers of mass tourist events and representatives of souvenir products. During the discussion the perspective of joint tourism projects of Sumy and Poltava regions was outlined.
Taras Savchenko, head of the Sumy Business Information Center, said: “Poltava is known for its cultural and historical heritage, tourist sites. Representatives of businesses and local authorities from Sumy supported us saying that there is an opportunity to develop joint tourist products”.
