The Network of Routes of emperor Charles V took part this morning in the webinar "COVID-19 and The Emperor Charles' route network took part this morning in the webinar "COVID-19 and the Council of Europe's cultural routes: impacts and responses", organized by the Council of Europe's European Institute of Cultural Routes. The aim of this initiative was to discuss the results of the research undertaken by this institute in order to evaluate the preliminary impacts of COVID-19 on the cultural routes certified by the Council of Europe and to reflect on the future measures to be taken.
Nearly 50 representatives of the 38 certified routes and other experts, such as the World Tourism Organization, took part in the webinar, in which common problems of interest to be faced by all those routes were discussed. Thus, among other issues, those representatives have requested active support from the Institute of Cultural Routes so that the certified routes have more presence when developing their purposes and activities, and has reported the development of a network at the level of the routes certified by the Council of Europe represented in Spain to promote cooperation between them.
On the other hand, the networks have also expressed their desire to further promote the development of tourism of proximity and rural and sustainable tourism, a scenario in which the Cultural Routes stand out for their strength and role. It is not in vain that they allow —and encourage— this when mobility is limited, since nowadays, from the tourist's point of view, security and trust are fundamental. That is why we are committed to developing safe and sustainable tourism (possible when we talk about rural tourism). In this sense, that works have been mentioned that are already developed in the form of projects in safe tourist companies, but also in safe destinations, fundamental for this purpose.
In addition, the development of online training projects aimed at transforming the courses to be implemented by virtual initiatives, such as the Charles V and The Sea courses planned for this year, which will be entirely online, or online training programmes on gastronomy linked to Charles V, which, in the case of this network of routes, we want to launch, in addition to another similar initiative focused on European funding opportunities and opportunities for the Routes, which we will organize on June 30.
Finally, it is the wish of the routes participating in the webinar to also bet on a greater presence through RRSS —as is the case of those of this network of routes— with the aim of keeping the image alive in our users and attracting new users for the future, when mobility is possible and the traditional activities linked to the routes can be resumed.
