Sarah Ticherou

2nd Youth Tourism Conference..

As the busy Summer season drew to a close and whilst things were still fresh in everyone’s minds, it was decided that now was an excellent time to reflect on key issues that have come to light over the Summer. With this in mind the 2nd UK Youth Tourism in Greece conference took place in Athens in October. Not only did we want to gain input from as many people as possible but we wanted to look at the results of the publicity campaign which had targeted over 400,000 youth tourists across Greece.

Conference participants were all those who have a part to play in the safety and organisation of youth tourists in Greece. This included the Mayors of the main youth resorts, representatives from the Greek Ministry of Tourism, the Greek Tourist Board, police and British tour Operators. For some it was the first time they had ever met together. We got a first-hand briefing on how everybody felt the season had been, an update on progress and action taken following the last conference and some brain-storming about what the next steps should be. The publicity campaign was deemed a great success - a useful step in the right direction and something that should carry on for Summer 2009. It was heartening to see that all participants have such excellent co-operation and are keen to work together to achieve short and long-term goals. The Ambassador chaired a lively discussion and we’re now looking at more activiities to further reduce the amount of incidents occurring. I genuinely believe with the continued commitment of all that next summer will be even better.

Posted at 07:11 16 October 2008 by Sarah Ticherou  |  Comments[1]

Youth Tourism....

One of the first things that struck me when I started was the amount of proactive work involved in this role. It wasn’t a case of just waiting for incidents to occur and then dealing with everything that comes with them; the Embassy and the vice-consuls from around the Greek network are actively working to reduce the amount of incidents before they happen. An example of this is the focus on Youth Tourism. Of the 3 million travellers to Greece last year, 30% were Youth. And 53% of all consular incidents happened to youth tourists.

The Youth Tourism Conference that was held at the British Embassy in Athens back in February brought together Mayors from the youth resorts, police, tour operators and key people from the Ministry of Tourism. It was a chance to get together to discuss the main issues and come up with tangible action points that could be worked on during the summer. These included issues such as drink quality, policing, and infrastructure – anything that would make the holidays ‘safer’ for the youth tourists.

On an island level this involves establishing close relationships with the local authorities and tour operators. Bringing everyone together to discuss resort-specific issues and agreeing actions can sometimes prove difficult. We are now at the busiest time of the year and everyone is juggling a hundred balls! But once points have been agreed and then seeing things take shape does make me feel we are contributing to making someone’s holiday that little bit more trouble-free.

Posted at 09:04 20 August 2008 by Sarah Ticherou  |  Comments[0]