Egypt’s Ministry of International Cooperation held a meeting with UN officials on Saturday to discuss a proposal to establish a platform to promote rural tourism in Egypt.
The meeting was held at the ministry’s headquarters in the New Administrative Capital, in the presence of representatives of Tourism and Antiquities Ministry, the Local Development Ministry, the United Nations Development Program, the Arab Academy for Science and Technology, and entrepreneurs in the field of tourism.
This comes under a cooperation framework between Egypt and the UN to advance development efforts and implement the outcomes for the first workshop of the UN Joint Team on Technology and Innovation (UN-JTDI) initiative.
The first workshop of the UN-JTDI initiative was organized by the Ministry of International Cooperation last year in coordination with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology.
It featured the participation of representatives of 18 UN agencies and nine ministries, with the aim of formulating non-standard and innovative government projects based on technology and innovation.
Saturday’s meeting discussed the most important challenges facing entrepreneurs in the business environment for rural tourism.
It also discussed the importance of creating a special platform for promoting rural tourism in order to link it to cultural heritage and folk arts, in partnership with the private sector in light of the state’s tendency to encourage private sector participation within various development efforts.
The project is under the supervision of the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities and the Ministry of Local Development in cooperation with the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).
A second workshop is scheduled to be held to continue discussions on preparing the project’s concept memorandum, in the presence of representatives of government agencies, international development partners, private sector, research centers, and civil society organizations.
