Conference "Marines - development opportunity for nautical tourism" held

On Tuesday, November 30, 2021, the Port Governance Agency and the Tourism Association of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Serbia held an online conference entitled "Marinas - a development opportunity for nautical tourism", dedicated to the presentation of the Study for the development of micro-locations of the marina network on the Danube and Sava, done by Agency. The meeting was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure, the Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Telecommunications, the Directorate for Inland Waterways, the Authority for Determination of the Seaworthiness, NATUS group and others.

The director of the Agency, Vuk Perović, pointed out that the conference is one in a series of meetings that the Agency will organize, in order to work together on the promotion of nautical tourism in Serbia. In regard to the steps which have been made in the standardization of marinas in the previous period, he stressed defining the conditions for marinas in the Regulation on the conditions to be met by ports, harbors and temporary transhipment sites and the declaration of the first port areas for marinas in Kladovo and Golubac by the Government of Serbia, which were declared on the initiative of the Agency. "We have recognized marinas as an important part of nautical tourism and prepared the Study for the development of micro-locations of the marina network on the Danube and Sava. The Study completes the legal framework and provides an opportunity for the development of this tourism industry. Defining the network of marinas creates conditions for investing in this area and encouraging new infrastructure projects, which include the construction, equipping and opening of marinas. Nine locations have been determined for further elaboration of technical solutions - five on the Danube, two on the Sava and two in the city of Belgrade. In addition, at the beginning of September this year, we signed a Memorandum of Understanding in the field of improving nautical tourism with the Ministry of Trade. The memorandum will promote nautical tourism in Serbia, because it emphasizes the importance of building and opening of new international passenger terminals and marinas. In accordance with the Memorandum, the Agency will work on planning of priority projects and their efficient implementation. The Agency's plans in the coming period in this area envisage launching initiatives for declaring new port areas, selecting port operators for marinas, investment projects for marina construction and raising the visibility of Serbia's nautical potentials in order to increase total tourism revenues. We will invest in marina in Golubac in 2022.", announced Perović.

Constant communication, exchange of experiences, development of new infrastructure projects and promotion of nautical possibilities of our country will contribute to make marinas an important segment of passenger waterway transport in Serbia, it was concluded on the conference.