Capacity Building for Sustainable Rural Tourism in Mozambique
CAST Mozambique is a project funded by the Austrian Development Cooperation and implemented by the Austrian Agency for Education and Internationalisation (OeAD) fostering a collaboration between IMC Krems in Austria and Universidade Eduardo Mondlane (UEM) in Mozambique. The aim is to develop a new Master’s curriculum on sustainable tourism and design more practice-oriented courses on sustainable rural tourism to ultimately empower communities, help diversify rural livelihoods, and contribute to curriculum development and skills development at UEM and in Mozambique more broadly.
Mozambique is a tropical country located on the southeastern coast of Africa. Despite facing issues such as foreign ownership, limited access to education and healthcare and natural disasters, it has strong potential, particularly when it comes to natural resources and tourism. Mozambique’s 2700 kms of coastline and particularly its rural areas and rich flora and fauna bear underused potential for tourism to date.
The Institute of Tourism, Wine Business and Marketing at the IMC University of Applied Sciences in Austria has partnered with Escola Superior de Hotelaria e Turismo (ESHTI) at Universidade Eduardo Mondlane’ (UEM) in Mozambique to promote sustainable rural tourism development in Mozambique. The collaboration involves capacity building activities in higher education, including teaching, research, administrative capacities, and the involvement of Mozambique’s rural communities in the tourism curriculum.