Welcome to the EMASeasy MOVE-IT! project!

            EMASeasy MOVE-IT! Manage and communicate a great and unique regional tourist «all inclusive product package » with EMAS

            The EMAS Easy MOVE-it! project applies the EU Eco-Management and Auditing Scheme (EMAS) cluster certification to regional tourist products or services. The project clusters small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) of a region, which are all part of a value chain of tourism. The value chain and thus the cluster forms a competitive tourism service package, linking cultural, economical, ecological and social aspects with their respective added value.

      The pilot applications cover various types of destinations and clusters in 6 EU member states: Belgium, Germany, Spain, Bulgaria, Cyprus and Estonia.

            Besides SMEs, the project is also focusing on active involvement of different stakeholders – local authorities, regional developers and tourism agencies. The innovation resides in the fact that the simple and practical EMAS easy methodology is used in territorial clusters with specific and online guidance to reduce the internal and external transaction costs of the effort of SMEs to implement EMAS.

                                     

            Furthermore, the approach aims to go beyond classical EMAS implementation as it will provide the key performance indicators on social, health and economical issues (anticipating EMAS III regulations) and will be linked to other local and regional schemes and labels under the EMAS scheme (e.g. Green Key, BIO Hotel, Eco-Label, regional environmental approaches etc).

            Major outputs and results:

- Coaching of at least 12 clusters and 200 SMEs in 6 EU Member States

- Development of bottom up sector specific guidance and performance indicators

- Expand 3 major regional labels to EMAS

- Online support and clustering tool for SMEs (reduced transaction costs by 50%)

- A business plan in order to coach other clusters and train regional agents/consultants in other countries

            The project is funded by the European Union’s Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) that aims to encourage the competitiveness of European enterprises.

            The CIP is divided into three programmes, the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Programme (EIP) being one of them. One of the focuses of EIP programme is to support eco-innovation. Projects in eco-innovation are supported by several initiatives, the EMASeasy MOVE-IT! project belongs to the pilot and market replication projects category.

This project is co-funded by the European Union within the CIP Eco-Innovation initiative of the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme