The Minister of Tourism Miroslav Borshosh visited the Chiprovtsi Carpet Festival, talked with the mayor of Chiprovtsi Plamen Petkov and got acquainted with local crafts, dariknews.bg reported.
„Northwest Bulgaria has everything it needs to develop tourism - excellent natural resources, crafts and hospitable people who can offer a good level of tourism product. The question is what the state has done, who and how much will work for this. We see that in recent years the northwest has been totally abandoned - there is no good infrastructure, marketing strategy for advertising the product, etc. We have started to develop a map to see where there is a good tourist product and a way to get to it", the minister said.
Borshosh said that in order to have a result and for the flow of tourists to come to a given place, joint efforts are needed from the state and local authorities and from the tourism industry. – I can give Chiprovtsi as an example in this regard - a clean and tidy municipality, preserved crafts, sufficient bed capacity. Now it is the state's turn to advertise the destination, to show what we offer and to make it clear to which market we offer it", the minister said.
He defined as a priority of the team in the ministry the preservation of crafts and the production of Chiprovtsi carpets as part of the intangible cultural heritage of our country. "This can not only increase the tourist flow, but also help people stay in their hometowns and fight the demographic crisis", said Borshosh.
The mayor of Chiprovtsi, Plamen Petkov, announced that the municipality is taking real steps to open a carpet weaving class at the school in Chiprovtsi and has already received inquiries from parents of children from all over the country and even from abroad who want to enroll their children to study the centuries-old craft of producing Chiprovtsi carpets on the town's characteristic Chiprovtsi loom. To this end, the municipality has already purchased a dormitory building to accommodate children from other villages in Bulgaria, has held talks with the Ministry of Education and has the "green light" to open the class.