Cultural tourism: the SFF radiates positive energy and national pride

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Source eKapija, 23. 07. 2010.
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Tourism, especially the cultural one, can easily thrive in B&H, if for nothing else but for events that have already become a world attraction, drawing more and more of the tourists every year. Those events are the Sarajevo Film Festival (SFF), Jazz festival, International theater fest MESS alive and kicking for 50 years now.

According to Altijana Maric, spokeswoman for the SFF, the event usually gathers around 2000 guests, only according to their official listing. However the number of visitors is larger than that, some estimates say. The data by the Chamber of Commerce of Sarajevo shows that the number of tourists in this canton has been increasing for the last five months, and the tourist sector hopes for Sarajevo becoming a tourist center due to the SFF and similar manifestations.

Other cities like Mostar, follow Sarajevo’s example, with diving off of the Old bridge, included as protected heritage to the UNESCO’s list. Religious tourism is becoming increasingly popular, more specifically pilgrimage to Medjugorje, the wholly place close by the city, visited by more than a million of tourists every year. Then events like Dani Matice Hrvatske and Mostar blues festival. Banja Luka is not without cultural events either such as Rock Open Air, that gathers bands from all around the world.

Vesna Bajsanski-Agić, executive director at the Mozaik Foundation, believes that cultural tourism is an untapped market, with a lot of potential for growth. “Unfortunately, that potential is just lying there, unused for many reasons, some of them better than the others”, she says. The Foundation Mozaik, has been developing a program that seeks to strengthen tourism, mostly in the smaller towns of B&H. The program is called “Cultural- historical heritage and tourism”.

Their recently completed project, "Bosnian Kingdom" is another successful example of cultural tourism, which aimed to link 10 town’s interesting stories about famous Bosnian kingdom and promote the cultural and historical values of our country.

“Thanks to the project, we somehow gathered that the main reason of the untapped cultural potential, is the fact that people are not proud of their own cultural legacy, which makes it difficult to turn it into a tourist offer”, said Bajsanski-Agic.

Economic growth and cultural tourism are closely related, obvious from the SFF that besides the film, offers a unique sense of pride and Sarajevo’s positive vibe – which is what really matters when developing a successful tourist brand.

She points out that in 2010 Mozaik will shift its program to Sarajevo, and develop three new products together with the help from European consultants, train new tourist guides and upgrade management of tourist attractions in the city, “ said Bajsanski-Agic. "We believe that we will all be proud of the cultural wealth we have and therefore effectively use the potential cultural tourism has for the economic development of our country," said Bajsanski-Agic.

D.Kozina