1998 Spanish Best Practices selected by the International Jury > http://habitat.aq.upm.es/bpes/onu98/bp438.en.html |
Nota del Editor: existe una actualización de esta práctica.
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Reference Date: 26-07-98
Experience selected in the 1998 Dubai Award for Best Practice, and catalogued as GOOD.
(
Best Practices Database.)
País/Country: Spain
United Nations Region: Europe
Ecological region: coastal
Activity: city/town
Partnerships: Local authority. Regional Government.
Community-based organisation (CBO).
Themes = Urban and Regional Planning: localizing Agenda 21.
Main contact:
Ayuntamiento (Local Authority)
Margarita Nájera Aranzabal (Mayoress of Calvià)
Ca'n Vich, 29
Calvià
Islas Baleares
Spain
07184
Tel: +34-971 13 91 00
Fax: +34-971 13 91 48
E-mail: calvia@calvia.com
http://www.calvia.com
Partner:
Secretary of State for Trade, Tourism and Small and Medium-sized
companies (Regional Government)
Carlos Díaz. Director General for Tourism
José Lázaro Galdiano, 6
Secr. Estado de Comercio, Turismo y PYME
Madrid
Spain
28036
Tel: +34-91 343 35 00
Partner One Support Type: Financial Support
Partner:
Department of tourism for the Balearic Islands (Other/Regional
Government)
José M. González Ortea - Councillor for Tourism
Can Despuig, 5
Conselleria de Turisme de Baleares
Palma de Mallorca
Baleares
Spain
07012
Tel: +34 971 17 61 91
Partner Two Support Type: Financial Support
Partner:
Associations of Hotel Owners (Community-based organisation (CBO))
Miguel Romaguera - Manager
Avda. Las Palmeras, 14 -1.
Magaluf (Calvià)
Mallorca-Islas Baleares
Spain
07182
Tel: +34-971 13 06 95
Fax: +34-971 13 21 75
Partner Three Support Type: Technical Support
Nominating Organization Address:
Spanish National Comittee (Other/Public, private and civil
association)
Marta García Nart
Paseo de la Castellana, 67
Ministerio de Fomento
Madrid
Spain
28071
Tel: +34-91 597 75 72
Fax: +34-91 597 86 04
E-mail:mgnart@mfom.es
Financial Profile:
Total operating budget for the year 1998:
Contribution from Calvià Town Council: Pesetas 45 million.
Contribution from Secretary of State for Tourism: Pesetas 45
million.
Contribution from Department of Tourism, Regional Government of the
Balearic Islands: Pesetas 45 million
4. Situation afterwards:
Calvià is developing and applying new long-term strategies based on
reorienting development towards new criteria of sustainability,
assuming a marked vocation for harmonising these strategies
through "Calvià Agenda Local 21".
It ensures its financial, social, environmental future and its
heritage through a strategic conception of balanced tourist
development, considering the environmental factor as a key
aspect and making the application to Calvià of the Resolution of
the Rio Summit Meeting in 1992 a reality.
5. Most important impacts as a result of the Good
Practice:
Capacity of a tourist resort to redefine its strategies by following an integrated conception of local development. Shows the possibility of real application of the Rio Summit Conference Resolution of 1992 in a town with widespread participation and social consensus and ensuring future generations the capacity to satisfy their economic, social and environmental needs in an environment of balanced tourist development.
1. Situation before the start of the initiative
Calvià was a mature tourist resort town, with its offer based
exclusively on sun and beach. There was an advanced level of the
breakdown of public and private facilities and equipment, with a
high degree of environmental impact, especially on the coastal
area. Given new outlooks and tourist demands, it was noted that
there was evident uncertainty about the future through the loss of
its competitiveness and its tourist attraction.
Traditionally, Calvià and the institutions associated with this
Project (Central Government and Autonomous Community), have
maintained relationships of collaboration and co-operation in the
development of different initiatives and programmes, especially
those deriving from the nomination of Calvià as a resort town
involved in the achievement of tourist excellence.
The town's economy, based solely and exclusively on a tourist
industry with a markedly seasonal nature and with evident signs of
ageing, influenced the whole of society of Calvià, characterised by
noticeable seasonal fluctuations in employment, with periods of
full employment, coinciding with the high season and others with a
high rate of unemployment in the low season. That is to say, the
society and its economy were highly influenced by the different
cycles of tourist flows.
On the other hand, the tourist industry, in its quest for the best
offer of sun and beach, used a land with unbeatable natural
conditions to set up on the coastal area, with the evident
destruction of coastal spaces. At the same time, the resources
needed for servicing the tourist population were affected by the
peaks cause by the seasonal nature of the market and its sizing and
availability became ever more difficult.
Faced with the situation describe above, and with Calvià town
council being aware that the town could not continue to bear the
high pressure on natural resources that arose from the single cash
crop of tourism with a marked seasonal nature, the need was posed
to break away from the trends and to face up to the threats that
had arisen from its own work by reorienting its economic, social
and environmental development towards new criteria based on
sustainability.
2. Preparing the information and clarifying the priorities
At the end of 1994, the Town Council of Calvià contacted working
groups which were drawing up strategies linked to the Local Agenda
21 and the conclusions of the Rio de Janeiro Conference, who then
drew up a document entitled "Local Agenda 21 for Calvià", which was
presented at the Meeting in Calvià of the European Ministers and
Heads of Tourism, in November 1995.
This document was discussed by the Full Meeting of the Town Council
on February 1st, 1996, which held a wide-reaching debate on the
future development of the town, concentrating on these key points:
This institutional initiative was the starting point for a number
of initiatives that are being introduced in Calvià, based on Local
Agenda 21, which we shall described in detail in this document.
Once the basic lines of its project had been established, the Town
Council of Calvià started contacts and negotiations with the
central government and with the Autonomous Community of the
Balearic Islands, which ended in the signing of an Agreement
between the Ministry for Public Works, Transport and the
Environment, the Autonomous Community of the Balearic Islands and
the Town Council of Calvià for collaborating in the development of
Local Agenda 21, for setting up in Calvià a Pilot Scheme for
Sustainable Development in Mature Tourist Resorts in the
Mediterranean, within the aims and programmes of the DG XI "Group
of European Cities towards Sustainability".
3. Formulation of objectives, strategies and mobilisation of resources
Calvià is developing and applying short, medium and long-term
strategies based on refocusing its economic and social development
towards new criteria, based on sustainability, summarised by:
4. Process
The most relevant phases of the process of Local Agenda 21 for
Calvià may be summed up in:
1996
5. Results achieved
The process for the development of the Local Agenda 21 for Calvià
through actions and strategies in the short, medium and long-term,
aimed at sustainability at sustainability have allowed the
preparation and set-up of short-term projects which are the basis
for guaranteeing the future of the whole process planned, amongst
which we may highlight:
At the same time, the participation, co-operation and
decision-making in the whole process have been institutionalised
for the Central Government, the Autonomous Community, the Town
Council, the Citizen Assessment forum, etc., which has allowed
greater integration and co-ordination amongst all the agents
involved.
6. Sustainability
Through the studies on the different Key Subject Areas, drawn up by
experts on each one of the subjects, we now know the state,
evolution, scenarios and alternatives for the different
aspects of local development and its relationship with
sustainability and the local quality of life.
The strategic objectives and key objectives that arise from these
studies allow a future scenario to be chosen as a reference for
local development which, once checked by the Assessment Forum and
the corresponding bodies, they are given priority by the Town
Council bearing in mind its aim of ensuring the protection and
preservation of the natural and cultural resources and the quality
of life in general.
The time scale studied for the different works to be developed
allows a projects plan to be drawn up for the short, mid an
long-term, which is coherent and fits the real needs for action on
the subject of sustainability, establishing indicators an
objectives, together with a process for monitoring and possible
adaptations to future needs or those not detected initially which
will ensure the continuity of the whole process.
The identification of problems and their causes has been carried
out through the study of the situation beforehand and the present
one for each one of the scenarios envisaged by the Key Subject
Areas "KSA" (Local Environment, Tourism and Local Economy, Cultural
Heritage, Population and Quality of Life, Town Planning System and
Key Environmental Sectors), analysing in each one of them the
different alternatives for the future and preparing proposals for
objectives and programmes to be developed using a common
methodology for each one of the KSAs and with all of it based on
indicators for sustainability.
Since the time of its preparation, Local Agenda 21 has followed a
painstaking process of publicity and adaptation of the municipal
structure and organisation so as to guarantee its execution,
mechanisms have been set up to achieve the objectives proposed and
different specific projects have been carried out in the short and
mid term, which gives the whole plan credibility. This has allowed
both the Central Government and Autonomous Community to participate
in the project and jointly co-operate financially both in its
development and in the execution of projects proposed in the Key
Subject Areas.
This project is being carried out as an initiative of the
Authorities to guarantee the economic, social, environmental future
and the future of the heritage of Calvià from the viewpoint of
sustainability and based on the investments needed for the
performance of different projects of very different types. Their
financing, according to their nature, is paid for both by the Town
Council of Calvià and in collaboration with Central Government and
the Autonomous Community, therefore there is no pre-established
system for the recovery of costs.
The resources needed are managed according to the nature of the
project and their financial cost.
Thus, the initiatives for publicising are mainly financed on the
basis of the Agreement between the Town Council, Central Government
and the Autonomous Community, with others referring to specific
projects being executed with finance from the European Union, the
Pla Mirall Consortium, specific Agreements with other Institutions,
etc. all of which bearing in mind the municipal capacity to
generate the resources needed to pay for the loans.
7. Lessons learnt
Taking the Rio Summit Meeting Resolution as the basis for its
preparation, and within the process of Local Agenda 21 for Calvià,
the Town Council has attended and participated in different
Meetings and Conferences on this subject, which have allowed it to
gain the prior experience needed to develop the project.
8. Transfer
Local Agenda 21 for Calvià intends, in parallel to its execution,
to develop a pilot experiment which may serve as a reference in
other mature tourist resorts around the Mediterranean coastline and
it is planned that an observatory will be created which will allow
the experiences obtained to be exported to other towns with similar
characteristics.
Local Agenda 21 for Calvià shall be an example within the
international context of the effective application on a local scale
of the 1992 Rio Summit Resolution an its conception and results
have already been recognised on a European level, with the prize
awarded to Calvià by the DG XI of the European Union as the
"Sustainable Town of Europe 1997".
References
1998 Spanish Best Practices selected by the International Jury > http://habitat.aq.upm.es/bpes/onu98/bp438.en.html |