TOURage Good Practice for Senior tourism
ACTIVE AND NATURE
Good Practice
1 Title of the practice
Eastern Carpathian Green Events & Wildlife Tours
2 Location (country, region/municipality)
Poland, Podkarpackie province, Bieszczady & Lesko counties
3 Contact information
38-710 Czarna Michniowiec, Poland, GSM +48 530 725 952, e-mail: grzegorz@przyrodakarpat.pl
4 Other interesting information (website, documents with www link: reports, presentations,
events etc.)
http://www.carpathianwildlife.eu
http://www.facebook.com/PrzyrodaKarpat
5 Details of the practice
5.1 Origin (organization etc.)
Carpathian Wildlife Foundation
5.2 Timescale (implementation period, continuous + starting time)
This is continuation of previous over 10 years experience of both Carpathian Wildlife Foundation
founders
5.3 Financing (budget, sources)
Grants including international private source like Dutch Postcode Lottery, the Swedish Postcode
Lottery, the Adessium Foundation, income from own businesses
5.4 Legal Framework (if applicable)
Foundation
5.5 Bodies involved in implementation, partners
International partners involved in Rewilding Europe initiative like WWF Netherlands, the ARK
Foundation, Conservation Capital, Wild Wonders of Europe and national WWF Poland
5.6 Target groups, beneficiaries
Both Polish and international markets, however the most important is Western European market
including birdwatchers and wildlife lovers from Great Britain and Netherlands, usually in the age
of 45-60. From year to year there are also more Polish nature lover at the age of 35-55.
6 Precise theme/issues tackled by the practice (problems/challenges/why this project?)
The Polish Eastern Carpathians area is visited annually by much more the one million guests,
including people at age 50+. However until 2004 there was no entity offering professional naturebased tour packages.
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TOURage Good Practice for Senior tourism
ACTIVE AND NATURE
7 Objectives of the practice
The main objective of Carpathian Wildlife Foundation is increase the number of European natureoriented visitors in Eastern Carpathians transboundary area between Poland, Slovakia and
Ukraine as well as offering nature-based tours to visitors already staying in the region, mostly
Polish ones. Moreover one of the goal is to show to the local inhabitants that the nature itself can
be also tourism product, not only yet existing mass tourism.
8 Connection to developing ageing tourism
The clients in the age of 50+ are the best target group for existing and developing nature-based
products in Polish Eastern Carpathians.
9 Evaluation (demonstrated results: indicators, success factors, difficulties, lessons learned)
In last over 10 years of activity there were organized guided tours for almost 1,000 nature lovers,
mostly citizens of Western Europe, including university students up to mature birdwatchers at the
age of 35-60. Moreover around 15 local nature guides have been trained and involved in servicing
of organized tours. Several years ago the crucial problem was badly international flights
connections with European countries.
10 Transferability of the practices (to other country, region, municipality: is it transferable?
already transferred? possible constrains and possible success factors to be taken into account?)
The neighbourhood areas of Slovakia and Ukraine, which also have a big potential for
development of nature-based tourism can learn a lot from Polish experience. In last 3 years
the knowledge referring to green tourism was transferred especially do Slovakia, where many
people participated in seminars and workshops.
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