Conference paper
NETOUR: A EUROPEAN NETWORK FOR EXCELLENCE IN TOURISM THROUGH ORGANIZATIONS AND UNIVERSITIES IN RUSSIA
Lidia Andrades
orcid.org/0000-0002-6489-7895
; Department of Business Administration and Sociology, Faculty of Business Administration and Economic Sciences, University of Extremadura, Spain
Frederic Dimanche
; SKEMA Business School Department of Marketing, France
Abstract
Russia is one of the fastest growing tourism markets (+8% growth in 2011) with many resources that are yet untapped. This paper presents NETOUR, a project of European and Russian universities that aims at boosting Russia’s competitiveness as a tourism destination. The purpose of this project, funded by the European Commission through a TEMPUS grant, is to propose a model for cooperation between universities and the main stakeholders in the tourism sector, in order to favour its sustainable development. Following a situation analysis of tourism in Russia, both from a supply and demand side, the researchers conduct an analysis of the gaps that exist between what Russian universities propose in tourism management education and what tourism professionals expect from higher education training and the competences they need to succeed. The results lead to university curriculum revisions on the one hand, and continuing education proposals on the other hand. The pillars that support NETOUR are: (1) Knowledge transference between Universities and society: facilitating the adoption of innovations by tourism firms, as well as reinforcing students’ employability; (2) Lifelong learning: identifying tourism professionals' knowledge, updating needs, and proposing specialized training according to their requests; (3) Open dialogue between the various stakeholders in the sector (i.e., policy makers, entrepreneurs, local population, alumni, students, professors, professional associations, etc.); (4) Design of new tourism management curricula according to the real educational needs of the sector. This ambitious three-year project should yield benefits for all tourism sector stakeholders and lead to improving the competitiveness of Russia as a tourism destination.
Keywords
tourism; competitiveness; network; higher education
Hrčak ID:
161542
URI
Publication date:
27.9.2013.
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