Montenegro

Licenses for Montenegrin Raft Skippers in Accordance with International Standards

Within the project «Unleashing Sustainable Tourism Entrepreneurship in the Area of National Park Durmitor (Žabljak, Šavnik, Plužine)», a training for whitewater river raft skippers was held between 13th and 20th May in Šćepan polje (Sastavci Camp), with an aim to make this profession part of National Professional Qualification System and to help in shaping of legal terms and conditions of doing this type of services, with an emphasis on legislated safety measures.

Under the auspices of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), based on professional standards accepted by the authorized Council for Education and organized by the Center for Vocational Education, the training was conducted for 15 raft skippers from 6 municipalities in the Northern Montenegro: Kolašin, Mojkovac, Žabljak, Nikšić, Plužine and Šavnik. Devised in line with the International Rafting Federation standards, it was adjusted to the whitewater river rafting conditions in Montenegro.

In order to make the training process transparent local NGOs and other interested stakeholders were invited to attend and the Ministry of Tourism obliged themselves to establish a commission which would work in the course of time on unification of this new comprehensive approach to the rafting issue in Montenegro.

However, even though the training lasted 8 days, representatives from NGOs attended only four hours of examination activities.

According to the indications of the Center for Vocational Education, in order to ensure sustainability and quality in all the segments of this tourism attraction, major priorities were defining of profession for raft skippers as part of National Profession Qualification, creating of a legal frame which will treat the ways and conditions of doing the services and conceiving of a training program verified by authorized institutions and entities. »The fact that this tourism attraction is offered in the most representative part of Montenegro, which is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site, obliges us to regulate this aspect of tourism offer and to adequately protect this precious jewel of nature. Not less important is protection of numerous users of rafting services, having in mind the increased danger, especially if tourists provided services by incompetent persons with inadequate equipment«, said Dušan Bošković, Advisor in the Center for Vocational Education .

Raft skippers were trained by experts from Slovenia and Montenegro: Janko Tavčar, president of the Rafting Association of Slovenia, member of the International Rafting Federation, as a member of Slovenian Rafting Team a winner of two gold medals at world championships; Prof Dr Dragoslav Nenezić, a doctor at the Clinical Center Podgorica/Montenegro and a teacher at several Universities in the region,  and Vasilije Bušković, expert-associate at the Montenegrin Institute for Protection of Nature, a biologist, Master of Science in nature protection and in management of protected areas.

Among other things at the training, Mr. Bušković lectured about natural potentials of Tara and measures for nature protection which are mandatory and based on legislation, as well as about the measures for environmental protection in «good rafting»). Mr. Bušković said that the training participants had shown great motivation even though their good previous knowledge was obvious.

Testing for raft skipping licenses was held on May 24th, also in Šćepan polje, at a place where water vortexes are the strongest. The Test Commission consisted of representatives from the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Transportation, the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare, the Center for Vocational Education and the Port Authority Bar which also has legal competence over the river Tara. This demonstrated a serious approach of the mentioned institutions and their awareness of the importance of a need to finally regulate the activities in this domain, the more since it is about the safety and the lives of rafting service users. Furthermore, in this way the state institutions took a stand to protect the raft skippers with licenses and gained insight into their numbers, and this all should lead in a very real sense to the sustainability and the quality of rafting as one of most wanted commercial tourist attractions.

 «The training was very hard but very useful even for us, raft skippers with 20 years of experience on Tara, who know each rock in the river and its changing mood», said Goran Leković from NGO Triftar.

 

The training domains were environmental protection, first aid assistance, rescue skills, rowing techniques, communication with tourists and conflict resolution. The aim was to enable trainees for a good quality performing of raft skipper duties and to help in gaining of competences for a safe boat/raft steering.  Danilo Grubač, director of TaraTours Agency Plužine said in his opinion the most useful part of training was about  first aid assistance and rescue skills because so far these aspects were but merely improvised. «Also, trainer Tavčar from Slovenia insisted on a sport variant of rafting techniques, which made a refreshing change comparing to the previous practice in tourism rafting which meant simple going through every whirlpool in the easiest possible way. It is good to know both techniques and in this way we expanded our rafting knowledge and skills», Mr. Grubač added.

In a questionnaire research conducted by the Center for Vocational Education 93% of trainees gave highest grades to the training.

Training expenses were 400 Euros per person which included the price of accommodations and food, the licenses issued by the Port Authority and the cost of trainers. Because this was the first official training of this type, the organizer covered all the expenses while in future the raft skippers will have to bear all the expenses on their own.

Tomica Paović, UNDP Montenegro Tourism and Entrepreneurship Coordinator, said: «Over the past ten days, during a very dynamic and interesting training, the raft skippers showed enviable knowledge and skills on a wild river which rapids at this time of year are far more difficult to subdue than in the summer. Given that this type of training, besides the compulsory theoretical part, fully focuses on practical aspects, all the participants in training including the Commission members agreed that this model should be applied to the other domains of adult education and training, too». According to Mr. Paović, training for raft skippers should contribute to improving service quality, inducing entrepreneurship and increase in income as in 2005, only within the borders of National Park Durmitor, over 3.000 tourists used rafting services and between 12 and 15 thousand tourists who rafted along the entire Tara river course in 2004 brought directly or indirectly more than 1 Million Euros of profit.

As for media coverage, two press releases were sent out to inform about the training but the final outcome went far beyond the usual journalists' copy/pasting aiming merely to inform the public about some training far up in the country north: thanks to negative (though biased) reaction from a local NGO and due to unfortunate accidental death of a raft skipper on Tara river, between May 16th and July 16th twelve articles showed up in local newspapers, 2 interviews with people from UNDP and local partners were made and 3 TV shows (duration between 20 – 30 minutes) were broadcasted on National TV. What most of them had in common was raising of public debate on how whitewater rafting can indeed be a dangerous sport, especially if the usual safety precautions are not observed. Thus, something that was conceived as a program for standardization of rafting licensing turned to a powerful theme that evoked passion and became very persuasive in terms of life safety issues.  

Thanks to this self-developed media advocacy campaign the decision makers are now fully aware of the need to address the problem instead of ignoring/postponing it and the result will hopefully be a fully functional institutional framework for rafting before the summer season 2007. Also, by this time everybody in Montenegro who intends to earn for a living in raft skipping business will be obliged to get a license in line with international/new local standards.