State Secretary for Tourism awards EDEN "European Destinations of Excellence" prizes to four Spanish destinations

The EDEN Project -"European Destinations of Excellence", is a European Commission initiative to highlight emerging and sustainable destinations on the continent. The fundamental idea is to create a network of European Destinations of Excellence to which both Member States and the European Commission itself contribute to offer visibility through its own platform, the exchange of good practices, etc.

In order to choose the destinations that form part of this network, Member States that wish to take part undertake a selection process, which was conducted on an annual basis between 2007 and 2011, and which, since then, has been conducted bi-annually.

In each round of calls, the prizes have a specific theme, but, at any event, the underlying idea is that awards go to emerging destinations that are characterised by their sustainable tourism management, from an environmental, social and economic nature.

The aim of the EDEN 2015 prizes is to raise the visibility of those emerging European tourist destinations that have developed new initiatives as part of their tourism offer based on the specific features of their local gastronomy.

In Spain, the selection process consisted of two phases. In the first phase, the autonomous regions chose a project to be presented to the State Secretariat for Tourism. 10 regions took part in the most popular round of calls to date.

In the second phase, the State Secretary for Tourism chose the winning destination and the three finalist destinations:

Winner:

• Goierri Turismo, with the project entitled "Goierri Gastronomika: Territorio Idiazabal".

Finalists:

• Local Council of Conil de la Frontera, with the project entitled "La ruta del Atún de Almadraba de Conil de la Frontera".
• District of Valles Pasiegos, with the project entitled "Valles Pasiegos: gastronomía de origen".
• Ceuta, with the project entitled "SalZone, Salazones de Ceuta"

On 16 December next, a gala event will take place for the presentation of the prizes in Brussels to be attended by the winner from each country; followed, on 17 December by the holding of a coordination meeting of the whole EDEN network, which the finalists of each edition are welcome to attend.