Tourism, forests and Vjosa/Kumbaro presents the budget of the Ministry of Tourism and Environment for 2024

2023-11-13 14:38:00, Aktualitet CNA

Tourism, forests and Vjosa/Kumbaro presents the budget of the Ministry of

The Minister of Tourism and Environment, Mirela Kumbaro, presented the draft budget for 2024 to the Committee for Production Activities, Trade and Environment. The Ministry of Tourism and Environment has prepared the budget details while maintaining the foreseen limits, in five budget programs that are summarized in Planning, Management, Administration , Environmental Protection, Forestry Administration, Tourism Development and Waste Management.

The budget of the Ministry of Tourism and Environment comes with a total increase of 35%, the result of the increase of the fund for the promotion of tourism and the integration of the new waste management program. As far as tourism is concerned, the total budget increase of 300 million lek comes to support Albania's participation in prestigious fairs such as FITUR Madrid and ITB Berlin, the organization in Tirana of the 70th meeting of the Commission for Europe of the World Tourism Organization, the organization in Albania of the convention of the French Confederation of Travel Enterprises "Les Entreprises du Voyage", as well as the calendar of tourist events that came under the TEA application. "In just a few months, TEA, the application that carries within itself the Calendar of Tourist Events in each municipality, has been installed 25 thousand times by visitors and vacationers, a sign that increases our energy to improve it during 2024, turning it into a long-term instrument of promoting tourist events", said Kumbaro, among other things.

Also, through the "Clean Beaches" operation, the municipalities of Lezhë and Shkodër will also be supported in 2024.

"The fund for cleaning the coastline during the summer months is increased to 250 million ALL. The experience of 2022 and 2023 where we intervened initially in 4 municipalities, to be added to 6 municipalities, showed that it was the right intervention to ensure a clean summer season in the face of the flows that have been the highest ever. For this reason, for 2024, the municipalities of Lezhë and Shkodër will be added to this program, along with Durrës, Kavaja, Rrogozhina, Vlora, Himara and Saranda, thus completing the entire coastline with increased cleaning forces through the National Coastal Agency. said Godfather.

Kumbaro also dedicated special attention to the Vjosa River National Park. "It is a courageous act that made Albania representative of a beautiful and sustainable model, as the most sincere symbol of the symbiosis of the environment and tourism. Now, again in cooperation with international experts, we are working on: the Park's integrated Management Plan, as well as the project of the new Visitor Center in the Vjosa National Park." On the other hand, the budget approved in the investment item also paves the way for investment in the rehabilitation of the "Elevation of Tourist Infrastructure with an emphasis on the water Eco-Park Ulza" which has started the procurement process this year to turn this area, a attractive space for the development of tourism with an investment value for the year 2024 of 200.6 million ALL.

Finally, Minister Kumbaro also mentioned the dedicated budget of 172 million ALL for the "Year of Forests" initiative during 2024. "A very important initiative that the Ministry of Tourism and Environment and the National Forestry Agency are working on, the announcement of 2024 as the "Year of Forests" for which we have predicted an investment of 172 million lek", said Kumbaro. It will be a year with the involvement of many actors, from the central institutions, the municipalities which are also administrators of the forests in the territory, to the National Agency of Protected Areas which administers about 21.5% of the territory where a large part of occupy forests, in organizations and society, with the aim of reforestation but also of raising awareness at the national level about the importance of forests.

Minister Mirela Kumbaro during her speech stated that she will soon turn to the Committee for Production Activities, Trade and Environment to get approval for the changes in the tourism law, for the "Extended Producer Responsibility" law, as she added that they are working on the new tourism strategy 2024-2030./ CNA