Clúster

Dozens of professionals participated in Vilagarcía in this forum, which was inaugurated by the councillor Álvaro Carou, the president of the Cluster, Cesáreo Pardal, and the president of the Provincial Council of Pontevedra, Carmela Silva.

After the intervention of prominent experts to talk about initiatives in the public and private spheres, the day was closed by the provincial deputy Ana María Mejías, the vice-president of the Cluster, Jesús Picallo, and the director of Tourism of Galicia, Nava Castro.

Dozens of professionals related to the world of tourism gathered last Tuesday in Vilagarcía de Arousa to attend the conference on “Good practices in tourism management” organized by the Cluster with the collaboration of the Provincial Council of Pontevedra and the Galicia Tourism Agency. Throughout the morning, experts from both the public and private sectors visited the municipal auditorium of Vilagarcía de Arousa to explain their experiences and exchange views on issues such as good destination practices, the importance of Big Data in hotel management, the design of tourism experiences and good business practices.

The president of the Provincial Council of Pontevedra, Carmela Silva; the councillor of Tourism of Vilagarcía, Álvaro Carou García, and the president of the Cluster, Cesáreo Pardal, inaugurated this conference that brought together experts such as Emilio Torres, representative of the project Vía Verde del Aceite; Paulo Queiroz, partner-manager of the Portuguese consultancy JPQ Consultores; Jaime de la Calzada, sales director of Amadeus Hospitality; the expert and consultant Víctor Sixto; María Troncoso, from #hosteleriaporelclima and Coca-Cola Europacific Partners; Rafael González, managing partner of Vivential Value, and Roberto Fraga, CEO of Pilgrim, as well as the provincial deputies Ana Laura Iglesias (Tourism and Youth) and Ana María Mejías (New Technologies and Business Development), who acted as moderators of two of the round tables held.

In his opening speech, Cesáreo Pardal spoke of the importance of improving the competitiveness of the sector and explained that this is necessarily linked “to digitalisation and sustainability, two key tools to face both the new challenges arising from climate change or the demand of a new tourist profile; as well as other more traditional challenges of the sector such as seasonality, overcrowding, security or mobility”. He also highlighted the Cluster’s commitment to a “tourism model that respects the environment, cultures and societies” and pointed out, as an example of this, the launch of the Galicia Destino Sostible Product Club, which already has 70 member companies.

The importance of sustainability, digitalisation and quality as hallmarks of our tourism sector was also one of the issues addressed at the close of the day by the Cluster’s vice-president, Jesús Picallo. “In this path we go hand in hand with public administrations, as in the elaboration in collaboration with the Tourism Agency of the Safe Destination Master Plan 2021-2023, which is developed around these pillars”, explained Jesús Picallo, in charge of putting the final point together with the provincial deputy Ana María Mejías, and the director of Tourism of Galicia, Nava Castro. The three also stressed the importance of public-private collaboration to ensure the development of the sector.