Today’s demanding and discerning tourists don’t wish to just observe, they wish to experience places. This experiential tourism trend is common to all involved territories, spans all niches and segments and is very relevant to off-season travellers (who choose this time not only to lower costs but to avoid crowds and increase chances for authentic interactions with locals).

The GAIMS project is funded by the European Union through the ENI CBC MED Programme. The project uses gamification: applying game design to create experiences for tourists. Offering such experiences can give a necessary competitive edge to the attractiveness of less known sites. But gamification is culturally sensitive – we do not all have the same sense of what is fun – so multicultural, cross-border evaluation of the initiatives is essential before opening them up to international tourists.

Some 40 games for 12 tourism sites in Lebanon, Jordan, Italy, and Spain will be developed. This includes physical (treasure hunts, crafts, etc.) as well as digital games (VR experiences, apps etc). Local games can be linked to encourage the exploration of more sites, longer stays, return visits. Public and private actors go through a structured process in the project, working and thinking together as tourism innovators and game entrepreneurs.

The project heavily relies on local communities to conceptualize and implement games, through self-employment or startups, for both high (technological) and low-skilled (manual, organizational) individuals, providing employment opportunities for both young and women. Local resources, priorities and goals for different tourist segments (social interaction, education, entertainment) will guide decisions in game selection. Strategic choices will be reflected in 8 destination plans.

Expected changes:

Change will take place on different levels. On a strategic level, destination managers will be more aware of the international phenomenon of experiential tourism and use of integrated game design. The gamification approach will impact visitor days, which in turn will have an indirect, trickle-down effect on tourist-related businesses, affecting their investment and employment –perceivable but hard to quantify and directly attribute to project actions. On a more direct level, the involvement of international and local game entrepreneurs in the design of games will result in a quantifiable number of short and mid-term contracts. Furthermore, the continued management of these games will develop into long-term employment and business contracts; especially where games are developed and managed by game entrepreneurs from local communities, and initiative-takers are guided by the project’s experts in business administration, in order to ensure that they are based on viable business models.

Total budget: € 2 381 238.04

European Union’s contribution: € 2 143 114.24

Partners

·         Lebanon: The American University at Beirut- AUB

·         Lebanon: Directorate of General Antiquities - Lebanon

·         Jordan: Jordan University of Science and Technology - JUST

·         Jordan: Department of Antiquities of Jordan

·         Italy: Fondazione Alghero Musei Eventi Turismo

·         Spain: Entitat Pública Empresarial Local Neàpolis

·         Spain: Fundació privada i2cat, internet i innovació digital a Catalunya

Contacts:

Aktham Oweidi

Director of Excavations& Surveys

Tel. +962 6 464 4336

Fax    :   +962 6 4615 848

This web page has been produced with the financial assistance of the European Union under the ENI CBC Mediterranean Sea Basin Programme. The contents of this page are the sole responsibility of Jordan University of Science and Technology and can under no circumstances be regarded as reflecting the position of the European Union or the Programme management structures.

The 2014-2020 ENI CBC Mediterranean Sea Basin Programme is a multilateral Cross-Border Cooperation (CBC) initiative funded by the European Neighbourhood Instrument (ENI). The Programme objective is to foster fair, equitable and sustainable economic, social and territorial development, which may advance cross-border integration and valorise participating countries’ territories and values. The following 13 countries participate in the Programme: Cyprus, Egypt, France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Malta, Palestine, Portugal, Spain, Tunisia. The Managing Authority (JMA) is the Autonomous Region of Sardinia (Italy). Official Programme languages are Arabic, English and French. For more information, please visit: www.enicbcmed.eu.

iHERITAGE

ICT Mediterranean platform for UNESCO cultural heritage

ENI CBC MEDITERRANEAN SEA BASIN PROGRAMME 2014-2020

STRATEGIC CALL

Thematic Objectives: A.2 – Support to education, research, technological development, and innovation (Promote economic and social development)

Priority: A.2.1 – Support technological transfer and commercialization of research results

IHERITAGE-ICT MEDITERRANEAN PLATFORM FOR UNESCO CULTURAL HERITAGE

iHeritage is an EU funded ENI CBC MED project that aims to advocate and increase the level of understanding of the joint Mediterranean UNESCO and intangible heritage. It will foster cross-border technological transfer, industry-academia collaboration, creation of Living Labs and spin-offs as well as the development of new products for improvement and enrichment By using Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR) and Mixed Reality (MR), and the latest available ICT technologies, iHeritage will be able to create an innovation-driven growth process for an extensive list of stakeholders and foster the active involvement of young people, females and those not in employment, education or training (NEETs) from 6 Mediterranean counties: Italy, Egypt, Spain, Jordan, Lebanon, and Portugal.

The project runs for 30 months in which various activities and outputs will directly contribute to increased employment opportunities, support collaborations among universities and industry, support SMEs, start-ups and spin-offs. Training services will tackle skill mismatches in the work field. The general public will sense the valuable contribution of the EU funded project through visibly enhanced access to UNESCO cultural heritage on-and off-site, the establishment of the ‘Regional Centre for Safeguarding and Valorisation of Mediterranean Intangible Cultural Heritage (CRESPIEM)’, job opportunities, and cross-border ICT platforms.

iHERITAGE impact will generate a concrete improvement in the access to UNESCO cultural heritage, on-site and off-site, in addition to the creation of cross-border ICT platforms, the establishment of the Regional Centre for Safeguarding and Valorisation of Mediterranean ICH (CRESPIEM), to be recognized under Category 2 of UNESCO, and a significant rise in the employment rate in the creative industry, thanks to the development of training courses and SMEs.

MAIN EXPECTED OUTPUTS OF THE PROJECT:

1.      18 Research Agreements aimed at strengthening people-institutions-industry-academia collaboration

2.      30 Establishing of spin-offs and newco dedicated to co-patenting and commercialization of innovative products

3.      76 Creation of innovative products/services – technology transfer of innovative solutions (46 new products by the project + 30 selected)

4.      46 Prototyping and testing within the Living Labs of the innovative products and services created by the project

5.      30 Events of commercialization of new products and services based on AR/VR/MR technologies and the use of Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Autonomous Database and Big Data

6.      6 High training courses

7.      400  Beneficiaries of training courses

8.      15  Co-publications produced in the Living Labs

9.      18 Co-patents aimed at developing innovative and marketable ICT products

10.  1 ICT Mediterranean Platform for the Valorisation of cross border Cultural heritage through AR/VR/MR

11.  1 Mediterranean Register of Intangible Cultural Heritage

PARTNERSHIP:

Applicant: Sicilian Region – Department of Tourism (Italy).

Partners no.1: Network of Castles and Medieval Towns (Italy).

Partners no.2: Confederation of Egyptian European Business Associations – CEEBA (Egypt),

Partners no.3: Association of the Mediterranean Chambers of Commerce and Industry – ASCAME (Spain).

Partners no.4: Jordan Society for Scientific Research, Entrepreneurship, and Creativity – JSSREC (Jordan).

Partners no.5: General Department of Antiquities of Jordan – DOA (Jordan).

Partners no.6: Lebanese American University – LAU (Lebanon – PP6).

Partners no.7: University of Algarve – UAlg (Portugal)

Partners no.8: Andalusian Public Foundation El Legado Andalusí (Spain)

Partners no.9: University of Palermo – Department of Architecture (Italy)

ASSOCIATED PARTNERS

Sicilian Region – Regional Department of Productive Activities (Italy)

Ministry of Culture, Lebanon- Directorate General of Antiquities (Lebanon)

Lebanese National Commission for UNESCO (Lebanon)

CNR – ITABC, Institute for Technologies Applied to Cultural Heritage (Italy)

Municipality of Byblos-Jbeil (Lebanon)

Region of Algarve – Department of Tourism (Portugal)

Duration: 30 months

Total budget value: € 3.874.287,06

Co-Financing Rate: 10.0%

Websites and Social Media:

website: www.enicbcmed.eu.