Virtual & Augmented Reality Trainers Toolbox To Foster Low Carbon Tourism & Related Entrepreneurship

<< Background >>At the time of the proposal submission stage, the VINCI partners realised that there was a need to foster low carbon good practices in the tourism sector. The EC had launched the 'Green Deal' action plan with the intent of making the EU's economy more sustainable by turning climate and environmental challenges into opportunities and making the transition just and inclusive for all. As clearly outlined in this action plan, the main economic actors i.e. EU businesses, consumers and citizens, were expected to be the driving force behind this transition towards a low-carbon and climate resilient continent. Clearly the EU tourism sector was a significant contributor to CO2 emissions. Thus there was a need to adapt low carbon practices in this sector to help meet the EU's ambitious 2030 targets. The partners realised the need that stakeholders such as tourists, agents, and hotels needed education and resources on low carbon tourism. Hence the VINCI partners planned to address these needs by providing VET trainers/tourism mentors with a set of innovative training resources they could use with different tourism stakeholders/learners to help them learn at their own pace, time on how to plan green travel paths and activities.<< Objectives >>By implementing this project, the partners aimed to foster a shift towards low carbon tourism (LCT) and foster related entrepreneurship. To achieve this, the VINCI project pooled experts on Climate Change/Sustainability, Tourism, Entrepreneurship, work-based training, VET Curriculum development and digital technologies. The partners thus set these objectives: OB1: to develop an innovative curriculum on LCT activities and related entrepreneurship; OB2: to raise awareness through 'best practice' case-studies of how tourism stakeholders can generate less CO2 emissions in all three phases of travel tourism; OB3: to develop a set of modular training resources on LCT activities and related entrepreneurship, some of which will be Augmented and/or Virtual Reality based to better engage learners; OB4: to develop the VINCI Toolbox consisting of a repository of digital training resources on LCT, including an m-/e-Learning platform to help stakeholders acquire skills on LCT even at their place of work & home;OB5: to develop a Trainer's e-book intended to guide VET trainers on specific training units and/or styles relevant to different tourism stakeholders;OB6: to widely disseminate the project results and how to manage LCT.<< Implementation >>The main project activities implemented during the VINCI project were as reflected in the rest of this final report related to:- Preparatory activities;- Project management activities;- Results (R1 - R4) planning and development work;- Results peer reviewing, testing and refinement activites ;- Knowledge sharing/exchange activities between the partners including via online meetings and face to face meetings- Knowledge sharting outside the partnership through press releases, newsletters, social media posts, multiplier events, project webpage updates and other means.<< Results >>The conrete outputs /results that emerged from the VINCI project are:R1: An Innovative Curriculum on Low Carbon Tourism concepts and related Entrepreneurship; Besides access from the webpage at www.vinci.eumecb.com, the Curriculum can be directly accessed from: https://tinyurl.com/b7wv3m3kR2: A Set of Twelve AR/VR based Case-studies of how stakeholders can generate less CO2 emissions in different phases involved in tourism; During the course of the project, these case-studies were found useful by stakeholders and as a matter of fact, the partners produced more i.e. a total of 34 case-studis. Besides access from the webpage at www.vinci.eumecb.com, the R2 case-studies can be directly accessed from: https://tinyurl.com/2xtuctmk R3: The VINCI 'Low Carbon Tourism and related Entrepreneurship' Digital VET Toolbox; The toolbox integrates the different resources together including the curriculum, case-studies, fact sheets e-/m-learning course etc. Besides access from the webpage at www.vinci.eumecb.com, the R3 VINCI Toolbox can be directly accessed from: http://www.camis.pub.ro/vinci/R4: The VINCI Trainers Guide e-Book on Low Carbon Tourism and related Entrepreneurship.Besides access from the results section on the webpage at www.vinci.eumecb.com, the R4 Guide can be directly accessed from: https://tinyurl.com/9mtdbp7nIn addition to the above, other concrete results that emerged from the project as detailed later in this report include:-Various VET trainers/learners, EU citizens and tourism stakeholders becoming more knowledgeabl on low carbon tourism-Various VET trainers/learners, EU citizens and tourism stakeholders willing to use the VINCI toolbox and results-VINCI partners willing to apply the project concept to new sectors -Better visibilty of the partners at both the EU and national level.