What changed

MOTION FOR A EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT RESOLUTION

P10_TA(2026)0123

on enhancingEnhancing connectivity, preserving cultural heritage,heritage and driving local excellence in European tourism – destination management and regional tourism growth

in European tourism: destination management and regional tourism growth

Committee on Transport and Tourism

(2025/2120(INI))

PE779.440

European Parliament resolution of 28 April 2026 on enhancing connectivity, preserving cultural heritage, and driving local excellence in European tourism: destination management and regional tourism growth (2025/2120(INI))

– having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, in particular Articles 174, 195 and 349 thereof,

– having regard to the report of the Committee on Transport and Tourism (A10-0078/2026),

A. whereas tourism directly accounts for approximately 5 % of the EU’s GDP, representing a major socio-economic sector in terms of value added, employment and regional cohesion, with strong multiplier effects across various sectors; whereas, once indirect and spillover impacts are factored in, the sector’s overall contribution rises to roughly 10 % of the EU’s GDP; whereas in some countries and regions, tourism accounts for an even higher share of employment and GDP, supporting regional development and reducing inequalities; whereas 90 % of the EU’s tourism sector is made up of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), including family-run businesses that are particularly vulnerable to crises; whereas the EU’s tourism industry comprises some 2.32,3 million SMEs and employs approximately 12.312,3 million people; whereas Europe remains a global leader in tourism and the world’s top tourist destination despite prevailing economic and geopolitical headwinds, with the sector projected to contribute 10.510,5 % to the EU’s GDP, following strong momentum in early 2025;

B. whereas the economic value of tourism is being increasingly challenged by social, cultural and environmental costs, including housing market pressures, higher living costs for residents, the fragmentation of living spaces, unsustainable resource use and the growing strain on essential infrastructure; whereas decades of volume-oriented growth, coupled with regulatory and governance gaps, have fostered unbalanced tourism; whereas these dynamics call for better governance and smart, sustainable and locally adapted management of demand; whereas tourism in itself is not a problem and preventing tourismphobia requires the adoption of a holistic strategy that reconciles economic growth with social well-being, environmental protection, the safeguarding of cultural heritage and long-term territorial resilience;

63. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission and the governments and parliaments of the Member States.

EXPLANATORY STATEMENT

Encompassing transport, travel services, hospitality, culture, sport and entertainment, the tourism ecosystem thrives only when these diverse threads are woven into a coordinated whole.As a global leader in tourism, contributing around 10 % of the EU economy, Europe must now lead the transition towards a more sustainable and balanced model that directly addresses growing social and environmental pressures, safeguards Europe’s heritage and keeps communities and visitors in balance.

Given its strategic importance, tourism needs a coherent EU strategy and targeted investment to stay competitive. This, in turn, calls for stronger coordination, including a dedicated directorate-general to strengthen governance and resource management. As a step to this direction, your Rapporteur welcomes the Commission’s forthcoming EU sustainable tourism strategy, which can provide a shared framework for a more sustainable, innovative and inclusive tourism model. The strategy should look beyond tourism’s economic role and underscore its role in social cohesion, shared prosperity and balanced territorial development, strengthened by connectivity, empowered destinations, and a skilled, culturally engaged workforce.

Enhanced connectivity

Transport connectivity powers every tourism experience, linking people to places, cultures and stories. Strong, efficient networks keep the sector sustainable and competitive by spreading visitor flows, relieving hotspots and boosting regional growth. But many potential destinations remain off the grid, and closing these gaps will require targeted support, robust infrastructure and dependable services to ensure tourism grows without shutting out local communities. Your Rapporteur therefore argues that the EU and its Member States must treat accessible, affordable and reliable transport as an essential service, underpinned by clear benchmarks for accessibility, affordability and quality – especially in remote, rural, island and outermost regions. Such services should not only guarantee residents’ mobility but also strengthen community connectivity, social inclusion and access to tourism destinations. Where existing measures fail to overcome persistent structural disadvantages, your Rapporteur calls on the Commission to develop additional tools to support citizens and businesses in peripheral, island and outermost regions, safeguarding their long-term viability and cohesion. In addition, your Rapporteur highlights the role of eco-taxes in financing projects that support both communities and the environment. Successful schemes already in place should be assessed as potential best practices, helping steer investment and promote balanced territorial development and shared prosperity.

Empowering Europe’s destinations

Unbalanced tourism can strain destinations, erode community life and dull Europe’s cultural and environmental edge, whereas well-planned tourism can do the opposite, strengthening social cohesion, protecting heritage and generating quality jobs. For this reason, your Rapporteur considers that, as part of the EU’s industrial strategy, tourism requires effective governance to better distribute demand between established and emerging destinations. Accordingly, the Commission and the Member States are encouraged to promote off-season travel and to boost the diversification and visibility of less frequented destinations through data-driven planning and targeted awareness-raising, helping to preserve Europe’s position as a leading global destination.

At the same time, your Rapporteur underscores the strategic role of DMOs, whose local presence enables strong partnerships across the tourism ecosystem. This makes structured, multi-level governance essential, bringing together local and regional authorities, DMOs and private stakeholders to shape coherent and inclusive tourism strategies. Because many small and rural destinations lack the administrative and analytical capacity to shape sustainable tourism strategies, targeted EU support is needed to build their management capabilities. Member States should therefore reinforce DMOs through financial support, technical know-how, improved coordination and workforce upskilling, enabling them to manage destinations effectively and with a long-term vision.

Your Rapporteur welcomes the new Regulation on short-term accommodation rentals as a meaningful advance in destination management. Nonetheless, the unchecked rise of such rentals continues to undermine housing affordability, weaken social cohesion and place pressure on essential urban services. As tourism must be built on the sustainable co-existence of residents and visitors, the Commission is urged to put forward legislation empowering public authorities to effectively regulate short-term rental activity. This should include a clear differentiation between commercial and non-commercial hosts, enabling targeted, proportionate and locally tailored management of short-term rental supply. The regulation should be accompanied by robust mechanisms to ensure that digital platforms effectively support the enforcement of national or local rules, including the application of night caps or other measures such as noise-mitigation.

Acknowledging the limitations of the EU’s Ecolabel, in particular its limited market uptake, your Rapporteur urges a more unified approach to sustainability labelling for European tourism, which is SMEfriendly and designed to strengthen sustainability, consumer trust and Europe’s global competitiveness. In a similar vein, the Commission and the Member States should support tourism’s transition to a circular-economy model, including by aligning sustainability labelling with circular economy principles, promoting measures that improve water, energy and waste-management efficiency, curb overconsumption, protect habitats and biodiversity, and reduce the environmental footprint of tourism through data-driven decision-making. Furthermore, the Commission should assess how the Single-Use Plastics Directive applies to tourism and hospitality, identify remaining gaps and propose measures to close them. This includes offering support and incentives to speed up the phaseout of singleuse plastics, based on solid evidence, stakeholder consultation and a realistic transition timeline, without imposing undue costs on small businesses. Finally, your Rapporteur calls for comprehensive metrics on quality employment, community wellbeing, resource efficiency, environmental impacts and carbon emissions, developed using globally recognised methodologies. These would support transparent policymaking, guide responsible investment and ensure comparability.

Bringing the considerations above together, your Rapporteur stresses that meaningful progress depends on clear funding mechanisms capable of supporting the transition to sustainable tourism models. While the next MFF’s proposals to strengthen EU support for sustainable, competitive and resilient tourism – particularly through the NRPPs Regulation and the European Competitiveness Fund – are welcome, it is regrettable that the new MFF once again omits a dedicated EU programme and standalone budget line for sustainable tourism.

Skills and cultural engagement

Culture and heritage, woven deeply into our daily lives, form the very essence of Europe’s tourism appeal and of our national and shared European identities. This living fabric – shaped by sustainable traditions, archaeological treasures and local languages – embodies the continuity of communities and the richness of regional identity. Preserving it depends on managing visitor flows responsibly and ensuring that local communities remain at the heart of decision-making. Digital tools such as interactive maps, augmented reality and community platforms can broaden access to heritage, strengthen small businesses and elevate the visitor experience.

In this context, your Rapporteur highlights the indispensable role of professional cultural workers, local organisations and volunteers as guardians of Europe’s cultural heritage. Through conservation, site stewardship and public engagement, they help sustain the uniqueness and attractiveness of Europe as a tourism destination. In recognition of the extraordinary commitment of volunteers who invest their personal time in protecting Europe’s cultural heritage, the Commission, together with the Member States, is encouraged to propose guidelines that enable cultural volunteering, including measures that lower barriers to participation and strengthen the recognition of cultural volunteers throughout the Union.

Europe’s tourism economy rests on the strength of a skilled and respected workforce. Yet this foundation is increasingly strained: low wages in parts of the sector, informal and part-time work, difficult conditions, seasonality and limited training continue to fuel labour and skills shortages. These pressures are compounded by persistent gender inequality, with women – who form the majority of the workforce – still disproportionately represented in low-paid and precarious roles. To address these structural weaknesses, your Rapporteur calls for a tourism labour market grounded in quality jobs, fair pay, robust social protection and year-round continuity, supported by paid training accessible to all workers, including seasonal staff during the off-season. Building on this approach, your Rapporteur proposes the introduction of a European tourism skills card, developed together with social partners and recognised across borders and sectors, to provide a trusted record of accredited training, competencies, qualifications, and professional experience. Such an initiative is essential for cultivating an adaptable workforce equipped with digital and green skills is essential to deliver innovative solutions that reconcile economic growth with environmental stewardship. At the same time, upskilling and reskilling must be matched by a genuine appreciation of every role – from the human-centred interactions that define quality service to the physically demanding tasks that keep tourism running – so that none of these strengths are lost as the sector embraces new approaches and innovations.

ANNEX: DECLARATION OF INPUT

The rapporteur declares under his exclusive responsibility that he did not include in his report input from interest representatives falling within the scope of the Interinstitutional Agreement on a mandatory transparency register, or from representatives of public authorities of third countries, including their diplomatic missions and embassies, to be listed in this Annex pursuant to Article 8 of Annex I to the Rules of Procedure.

6.2.2026

LETTER OF THE COMMITTEE ON CULTURE AND EDUCATION

Ms Elissavet VozembergVrionidi

Chair

Committee on Transport and Tourism

BRUSSELS

Subject: Opinion on enhancing connectivity, preserving cultural heritage, and driving local excellence in European tourism: destination management and regional tourism growth (2025/2120(INI))

Dear Madam Chair,

Under the procedure referred to above, the Committee on Culture and Education has been asked to submit an opinion to your Committee. At a meeting of 5 November 2025, the Committee on Culture and Education Committee decided to send the opinion in the form of a letter. It considered the matter at its meeting of 27 January 2026 and adopted the opinion at that meeting. I now call on the Committee on Transport and Tourism, as the Committee responsible, to incorporate the following suggestions into its final report.

SUGGESTIONS

A. Recognises the cultural and creative sectors as pillars of sustainable growth, social cohesion and competitiveness in the European Union, with over 7.9 million people employed in cultural activities in 2024, which equals 3.8% of total employment, and includes around 1.2 million firms, of which over 99% are SMEs, representing 3.95% of EU value added;

B. Views cultural tourism, with all its various components, including sports tourism, as one of the main drivers of tourism in Europe, capable of strengthening the local economy and promoting good practices for the conservation and authentic interpretation of cultural heritage in addition to promoting Europe’s cultural diversity;

C. Highlights that mountainous, outermost, maritime, rural and remote regions offer unique landscapes, culture and traditions and that improving their connectivity is essential to enable local communities to live, work and thrive, preserving cultural excellence and identities;

D. Whereas overtourism, and other non-sustainable tourism practices, risk harming cultural heritage, inflating living costs and contributing to the housing crisis; whereas effective use of management plans, that respect local communities, contributes positively to the protection of cultural heritage, harnessing unique cultural assets sustainably and responsibly, whilst fostering innovation, competitiveness and sustainable economic growth;

1. Emphasises the need to protect all forms of cultural heritage, both tangible and intangible, recognising their crucial role as an educational resource for future generations and in promoting regional, national and European identities, cultural diversity, social cohesion, and sustainable economic development;

2. Stresses the importance of placing local communities and cultural heritage including cultural landscapes at the centre of decision-making regarding the management of all tourism activities, including cultural, sporting and wellbeing activities, in order to ensure equitable benefits for both the citizens and cultural resources;

3. Calls on Member States to launch cultural tourism campaigns that promote lesser-known destinations and underused or disadvantaged areas, to create a more balanced cultural tourism landscape that fosters bottom-up approaches in policy making, strategic planning and destination management;

4. Encourages Member States to develop flexible cultural and sustainable tourism offerings capable of responding to increasingly varied demands in terms of motivations, trends, and seasonal patterns, articulating the offering into targeted tourism sectors (gastronomy wellness, nature) through strong collaboration between the public and private sectors, and highlighting the role of cultural and sports activities as tourist attractions;

5. Emphasises the critical role of digital technologies and artificial intelligence in improving the visibility, visitor flow management, carrying capacity, accessibility, and enjoyment of cultural heritage, with particular benefit to smaller and geographically disadvantaged areas, in order to counter depopulation, desertification and to preserve wellbeing; stresses the adoption of digital and AI tools should follow a human-centric and rights-based approach;

6. Calls for investing in the digitisation of cultural content and in digital skills for cultural workers, while stressing that such tools should complement, not replace in-person cultural experiences and community-based tourism.

7. Highlights the use of digital technologies and innovative tools to support alternative cultural tourism where sites are too fragile to be visited in person;

8. Calls on Member States to fund eco-sustainable development, including transport to, from and around cultural sites, in order to ensure sustainable destination management, promote local prosperity and strengthen social cohesion in the European Union.

9. Highlights the new strategic framework called the Culture Compass, as well as the potential of Union initiatives such as DiscoverEU, European Capitals of Culture, and the European Heritage Label as valuable tools to make European cultural heritage more accessible to young people, particularly those with fewer opportunities; and encourages their meaningful inclusion in cultural and tourism governance structures;

10. Highlights the value of cultural routes and long-distance walking trails, such as the European Cultural Routes, as engines of sustainable, community-based tourism; calls for stronger European cooperation with shared sustainability standards, heritage and its protection, coordinated signage and accessibility to reinforce their role as transnational cultural bridges;

11. Calls for cultural tourism strategies that prioritise accessibility, so that all people, including persons with disabilities, can fully enjoy cultural experiences.

Yours sincerely,

Nela Riehl

ANNEX: DECLARATION OF INPUT

The rapporteur for opinion, Ms Lara Magoni, declares under her exclusive responsibility that she did not include in her opinion input from interest representatives falling within the scope of the Interinstitutional Agreement on a mandatory transparency register, or from representatives of public authorities of third countries, including their diplomatic missions and embassies, to be listed in this Annex pursuant to Article 8 of Annex I to the Rules of Procedure.

INFORMATION ON ADOPTION BY THE COMMITTEE RESPONSIBLE

Date adopted

18.3.2026

Result of final vote

+:

–:

0:

33

4

4

FINAL VOTE BY ROLL CALL BY THE COMMITTEE RESPONSIBLE

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