The waterway regions involved in SWARE all share unique natural and cultural heritage: protected areas with rich biodiversity and a bunch of enticing historic cities and buildings connected to water. These amenities make them more and more attractive for leisure activities resulting in an ever growing number of visitors (30-50% increase in the past 10 years) which causes tensions with heritage conservation aspects. All SWARE partners recognize that the socioeconomic future of their regions is fundamentally depending on finding the synergies between preserving the cultural and natural values for the next generations and at the same time "opening their gates" with a controlled visitor management. By demonstrating the economic value that a "green" leisure industry can bring to a region, it can build strong public and political support both for heritage protection and sustainable valorisation thereof.
What SWARE strives for is achieving a better balance between protection and sustainable exploitation of the valuable natural and cultural resources through improving the development programmes and policies of the partner regions, based on the transfer of good practices of other participating regions. Partners share the common bottleneck of fragmented governance structures without proper cooperation forms, therefore SWARE will stimulate the establishment of new participatory governance schemes having a much better potential to implement efficient policies contributing to the sustainable regional development. As an overall result, decision makers, public and private players, as well as inhabitants will gain a better knowledge and commitment towards protecting and sustainably "using" their environmental and cultural assets.
This website reflects the author' s views only and the Interreg Europe programme authorities are not liable for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.
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Title
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Sustainable heritage management of WAterway REgions
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Abbreviation
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SWARE
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Lead partner
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Association Regio Water (Netherlands)
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| Programme |
Interreg Europe 2014-2020 |
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Partners
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1. Association Regio Water (Netherlands)
2. Tipperary County Council (Ireland)
3. Metropolitan City of Milan (Italy)
4. Pons Danubii European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation (Slovakia)
5. Vidzeme Planning Region (Latvia)
6. Province of Zuid-Holland (Netherlands)
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Objectives
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The overall objective of the project is to foster integrated management of natural and cultural heritage within inland waterway regions by improving the partner regions’ related policy instruments in order to create a better balance between the protection and sustainable exploitation of the natural resources and the built heritage sites.
The subobjectives of SWARE project are:
- establishment of integrated multilevel and participatory governance schemes and frameworks;
- raising awareness and create a common understanding in all related sectors towards the holistic interpretation of sustainable valorisation of heritage sites and the need forshaping an ecoconscious attitude of visitors of these valuable environments.
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Activities
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- Interregional policy learning and good practice exchange;
- Setting up multilevel and multistakeholder governance frameworks;
- Informal education on sustainability and conservation issues;
- Development and implementation of regional Action plans;
- Dissemination and communication activities.
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Results
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- Better balance between the protection and sustainable exploitation of the natural resources and the built heritage sites;
- More effective, integrated regional heritage management;
- Stimulated stakeholder commitment related to sustainable heritage valorisation;
- Increased engagement of inhabitants towards protecting and promoting the environmental/cultural values of their localities;
- Enhanced regional attractiveness;
- New job opportunities and green investments;
- General wellbeing of the inhabitants.
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Budget
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Total – 1 365 338 EUR
Vidzeme Planning Region - 161 510 EUR
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Implementation period
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01.04.2016 – 30.09.2020
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Contact person
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Lelde Ābele
Tel. +371 64219021
lelde.abele@vidzeme.lv
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| Project website |
http://www.interregeurope.eu/sware/ |
