ST3ER (Scaling Twin Transition in Tourism by harnessing the Experience Economy for greater Resilience) supports tourism and creative SMEs in developing digital and green innovation projects in 5 countries and strengthens their capacity to become more resilient and sustainable.
The 3-year project is coordinated by Údarás na Gaeltachta and co-funded by the European Union following a competitive call by the European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA). This call for proposals was part of the overall COVID-19 recovery strategy for a sustainable tourism ecosystem and in particular aims at equipping and empowering SMEs in their twin transition efforts in line with the Tourism Transition Pathway. The action aims to guide the forward-looking recovery of the tourism ecosystem by providing support to the digital and green transformation of tourism companies, particularly SMEs, and boosting innovation, resilience, sustainability, and quality along the tourism value chain.
In addition to Údarás na Gaeltachta as lead partner and coordinator, the ST3ER project has 5 other partners from five countries: WestBIC (Ireland), CEEI Báhia de Cádiz (Spain), Science and Technology Park of University of Porto (Portugal), Razvojni Center SRCA Slovenije (Slovenia) and Creative Business Network (Denmark).
The project aims to enhance the competitiveness of tourism SMEs and facilitate their green and digital transition through capacity building of tourism SMEs, fostering innovative solutions for sustainable tourism, delivering a 6-month accelerator with a focus of scaling SMEs, and promoting best practice exchanges, knowledge sharing and transfer.
Rónán Ó Coisdealbha, Director at Údarás na Gaeltachta, highlights the crucial role of creative and innovation competencies in achieving success in the green and digital transition:
“This type of expertise plays a crucial role in creating radically new solutions to complex societal challenges. To achieve radical shifts in the tourism industry, a comprehensive approach and creative competencies are necessary at the SME level.”
The total project budget is €3.2 million and will provide cascade funding of €1.96m directly to SMEs in support of 72 innovation projects, over 2 open calls and 3 themes/financing categories. Further information is available at www.st3er.eu
