Tu-MoDeLo: Turismo – Motor de Desarrollo Local

The main goal of this initiative is to improve the lives of farming communities and those employed in the tourism industry through the Identification of market opportunities for sustainable agriculture products for the tourism sector. The Project will require the following: 1. Mapping key tourism regions with potential to become local markets 2. Selecting value chains and inventorying current suppliers. 3. Strengthening business capabilities among producers. 4. Facilitating access to financial resources. 5. Identifying training needs among participating tourism businesses. 6. Signing sustainable procurement agreements. 7. Participating tourists. This project started at the end of 2018, all the activities will begin their implementation in 2019. The Timeline for the development of this Project is 3 years, with the possibility to assess impacts on year 3 and explore its continuation for 2 more years. The plan is to begin the implementation in January 2019. Activities will continuously evolve over the 3 years. In the beggining of the project some regions and value chains are going to be identified, once they are already identified, the participating producers and their training needs will be defined. The impact in this stage will be to address such needs through a coordinated effort leveraging training and assistance programs already developed. These capacity building efforts will then be accompanied by an on-going technical assistance program to help producers understand the needs of the tourism sector and how to secure participation in their value chains. Participating producers will have access to financial resources to implement sustainable agricultural practices and grow the sales of their products to tourism companies, through the coordination with local organizations that currently facilitate loans and microcredits to farmers. Similarly, participating tourism companies will be trained and assisted in best practices for sustainable procurement, and in the development of green, local procurement policies and implementation plans. We will work with business owners, general managers, chefs, procurement personnel, kitchen and frontline staff to engage them in this effort. An important impact of the project is that the supply of agriculture products from participating producers will be connected with tourism companies. Some examples include leveraging/strengthening existing distribution channels, creating new ones, conducting marketing activities and business meetings, trade shows, local culinary contests, coordination with renowned gastronomic schools and others. Finally the Project will disseminate directly to the tourist information about hotels and restaurants that have a commitment to sustainable procurement. Activities include participation in key tourism and gastronomic events; developing informational materials (website, blog, apps, etc.) for consumers in alliance with educational institutions; social and traditional media coverage; alliances with tour operators interested in featuring the Project and its beneficiaries (producers, hotels, restaurants) in their tour packages; and supporting local efforts to create gastronomic tourist routes.