Networking day for a sustainable Maresme

The Costa de Barcelona Maresme destination has been distinguished, since 2017, with the Biosphere Sustainable Committed label, which recognizes efforts to guarantee environmental, social, cultural and economic benefits to the destination. In the same way, the tourist organizations of the Maresme also work on obtaining and renewing this certification annually, which grants them an iterative procedure of continuous improvement in the promotion of sustainability from their respective activities; process that Pax# has been part of as an advisory team since its inception.

In the annual procedure for obtaining and renewing the Biosphere certification, a Badge Awarding Day is held in the region, in order to emphasize the fulfillment of the standards required by the certification for the companies. However, this year the Tourist Promotion Consortium Costa del Maresme innovated with the celebration of an exciting day that, beyond the ordinary delivery of badges, took advantage of the presence of the region’s private tourism fabric to promote, in a fun and enjoyable way, sustainable networking between these entities, and the presentation of the 2024 Action Plan of the Promotion Consortium body.

The challenge of the Pax# team, therefore, was to organize the dynamics of this meeting, ensure the participation of tourism agents, and act as a moderating agent for the entire session. In short, the day meeting contemplated three main objectives:

1. Present the 2024 Action Plan of the Tourism Promotion Consortium Costa del Maresme.
2. Encourage participation and networking between companies and tourist organizations in the Maresme region that work based on sustainable criteria.
3. Deliver the usual Biosphere Sustainable badges to companies and entities in the region.

For the celebration of this meeting, Pau Pitarch de Dalmases, partner of Pax# Genuine Tourism Advisors, acted as moderator of the activity. The first part of the session was dedicated to the presentation of the 2024 Action Plan of the Tourism Promotion Consortium, which, through a round table format, had the presence and participation of the entire technical team of this body.

Subsequently, the Pax# technical team had worked on the design of a dynamic that was divided into three distinct activities, worked on and participated in at the same time, in working groups. These activities, designed to promote networking and the creation of synergies between tourism agents in the Maresme, encouraged participation in short-term workshops, which were excitingly related to sustainability issues in the Maresme, while promoting work in teams and the proposal of ideas from the participants. The three activities each had a different message for sustainable Maresme, which is why each was given a different symbology, corresponding to: the smile activity, the bicycle activity, and the wishing tree activity. Each of these activities lasted approximately half an hour, and the three groups were able to participate in all of them on a rotating basis.

To end the day, the last part of the session was reserved for the delivery of Biosphere badges to entities and companies certified for the first time and for renewal, and also for the recognition of the Maresme Tourist Information Points.

A differentiating aspect of this meeting day was also having the support of two actresses, who made this celebration a relaxed and encouraging meeting, an aspect that was very positively evaluated by the participants.

The involvement of the Tourist Promotion Consortium Costa del Maresme with the territory and its entities, the creativity and dynamism of the Pax# team, the good predisposition and desire on the part of the entities of the Maresme, the good energy transmitted by the hired actresses… are some of the elements that made this day a complete success. The reception by the attendees was very good, and the initiative turned out to be an original and different way to promote the networking of the Maresme as a destination committed to sustainability.