EC SUPPORT TO TOURISM BUSINESS

The European Commission is involved in initiatives that improve the skills and mobility of workers, particularly by engaging in global digital networks and helping tourism entrepreneurs manage their businesses. The Commission manages a range of initiatives that help small businesses in the tourism sector. Given the huge impact that digital technologies have on the sector, supporting access to and use of ICT is a priority area for the Commission.

The Commission is also involved in actions that aim to increase the responsiveness of education and training to labour market needs and help entrepreneurs gain the necessary skills to manage their businesses.

Tourism Business Portal

The  Tourism Business Portal was launched by the Commission to help European tourism companies better manage their enterprises. It provides practical, up-to-date information on digital technologies and innovative business practices, which can be easily applied when setting up, managing, promoting and expanding a tourism business. It is part of the Commission’s commitment to improve the competitiveness of the industry in the global digital market place.

Digital Tourism

The European Commission has implemented several actions to boost the competitiveness of small businesses in the European tourism sector, integrate them into global digital value chains, and improve their ability to create more jobs.

Actions to help tourism businesses go digital

Live events on digital tourism: This pilot series of webinars is designed to provide guidance on digital issues to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the tourism industry. Led by industry experts, the webinars examine recent trends in tourists' use of technology to discover, plan and share their travel experiences. Topics covered include: digital marketing strategy; online reputation and use of social media; m-tourism (use of smartphones throughout the entire customer experience).

Digital Tourism Network: A digital Tourism Network has been launched that will comprise representatives from the industry and EU countries to discuss how to boost the innovation capacity of tourism entrepreneurs, especially SMEs.

The Network will:

• serve as a forum to brainstorm on challenges and opportunities for digital tourism businesses, such as regulatory fragmentation, ensuring a level playing field, big data ownership and access to technology;
• help shape new actions designed to increase the uptake of digital technologies by the tourism sector and improve SMEs' inclusion in the global digital value chain;
• serve as a contact point for their respective networks, including for example, technology providers, online tourism actors of all sizes, traditional tourism service providers, digital policy influencers and public administrations.

The tourism representatives will come from the public and private sector, from both digital and non-digital backgrounds.

Tourism Business Portal: The Tourism Business Portal is a one-stop-shop to improve the establishment, management, promotion, and expansion of businesses. It includes plenty of articles, tutorials, online tools, and links to best practices to help entrepreneurs learn about the management of a tourism business in the digital era.

Aims of the actions

• strengthen the skill base of tourism SMEs, whose growth potential is often unexploited due to limited access to life-long learning and awareness of developments in the smart use of technologies;
• include small businesses in the digital value chain by:
  • helping with the design of tailored digital solutions for the tourism industry;
  • offering a chance to take full advantage of the opportunities of the digital market to increase competitiveness;
  • providing access to new business opportunities and new markets to increase visibility and revenues;
• boost the ICT-driven innovation potential of tourism SMEs and empower tourism entrepreneurs in online marketisation.

Professional Skills

To maintain Europe’s leading position amongst the world's tourism destinations, the industry needs to continuously improve the quality and mobility of its staff to provide top quality, personalised services to all tourists. Adapting tourism to globalisation and new market demands requires that efforts are made to improve the professional skills of workers in the sector. The workforce must adapt to new technologies and changes in customer expectations. In particular, this involves the demand for customised travel experiences that can be planned, recorded and, reviewed in across multiple digital platforms. Cross-border mobility also needs to be encouraged.

Directorate General (DG) for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs works on initiatives to improve professional skills in the tourism, and continuously searches for opportunities to collaborate with other DGs.

Dedicated hospitality section in EURES – the EU Job Mobility Portal: Since 2014, EURES- the EU Job Mobility Portal – offers a dedicated section for generating skills passports for the tourism and hospitality sector. It allows jobseekers to present their skill profiles, document their formal and informal qualifications, and have their experiences endorsed by previous employers. At the same time, employers can search for job candidates to fill vacancies. This tool facilitates a better match of supply and demand in the labour market and improves the mobility of European workers.

Study to map the skills and training needs for the improved accessibility of tourism services: The study, ‘Improving Information on accessible tourism for disabled people', mapped the skills needed to improve the accessibility and safety of tourism services for disabled people and people with special needs. It analysed the availability and the performance of training (both vocational and educational). The mapping exercise was complemented by a performance check of training provisions and barriers to training and an analysis of 20 case studies on skills and training provision which highlighted their strengths and weaknesses. The study was presented at a conference held in Brussels in June 2014.

Study to map and check the performance of the supply side of education and training for the tourism sector: This study will provide an overview of the provision of education and training dedicated to tourism occupations, the skills covered by its learning outcomes, and the skills needs that remain unattended. Best practices for delivering the desired learning outcomes and addressing the sector's needs will be analysed and released at a final conference in October 2015. Recommendations and an action plan to further deploy and transfer the best practices will be put up for discussion at round tables.

Classification of tourism skills and qualifications: In cooperation with the industry and academia, the Commission is developing the ESCO classification (European Skills/Competences, Occupations and Qualifications) specifically dedicated to skills profiles needed in the tourism sector.

Monitoring Opportunities: The Commission also monitors existing EU programmes for opportunities to improve professional skills in the tourism sector. Actions include:

1. Integrating tourism-specific initiatives into EU funding programmes for training such as ‘Erasmus+' and 'Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs’, and participating in their promotion.
2. Monitoring sector-specific developments in common European frameworks, such as the European Qualifications Framework (EQF) and the European Credit System for Vocational Education and Training (ECVET).
3. A dedicated project funded under the Sector Skills Alliances where hospitality is among the pilot industries.

Enterprise Europe Network: tourism and cultural heritage: The Directorate-General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs supports the Tourism and Cultural Heritage Group of the Enterprise Europe Network. The Enterprise Europe Network is a key initiative of the European Commission that helps small companies make the most of business opportunities in the EU. The Tourism and Cultural Heritage Sector Group is one of 17 expert sector groups at the Enterprise Europe Network who organise brokerage events to help businesses reach technology transfer or cooperation agreements with other companies in their sector.

The Tourism and Cultural Heritage Sector Group also provides other services such as:

• finding business partners for tourism products and services throughout Europe;
• promoting new technologies for tourism and cultural heritage at national and European level;
• arranging bilateral meetings with potential partners at tourism and cultural heritage fairs and company missions (notably in the context of the Mission for Growth initiative);
• advising companies on funding opportunities and helping them apply for EU grants;
• promoting and implementing multidisciplinary research projects in tourism and cultural heritage;
• providing information about international conferences and workshops;
• providing guidelines on starting a business in tourism;
• communicating small business interests and concerns to EU policy makers.