IGTN and GardenTours.com Join Forces to Bring Garden Tourism into the Mainstream
Toronto, Canada. (PRWEB) March 16, 2015 -- Today, the International Garden Tourism Network (IGTN) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with GardenTours.com, the leading online travel guide to the world’s best gardens, tours and garden events, making GardenTours.com its official consumer website.
In 2013, Professor Richard W. Benfield's pioneering research (*) suggested that more than 300 million people per year travel to see public and private gardens and that for many countries, gardens are the most popular and widely visited of all tourist attractions. With the UNWTO World Tourism Barometer forecasting international tourism to grow by 3% to 4% in 2015 from a total of 1.1 billion in 2014, the global tourism landscape is becoming increasingly competitive and this is why Garden Tourism matters.
“Garden Tourism can be a significant differentiating factor for national and regional tourism organizations seeking to attract increasingly discerning tourists,” says Dr. Ian A. Kain, Managing Director of GardenTours.com. “With IGTN, we aim to play a central role in the development of sustainable Garden Tourism worldwide.”
As part of the agreement, IGTN will provide advice and the expert knowledge that will establish GardenTours.com as the definitive go-to website for consumers who wish to visit gardens and garden events anywhere around the world.
“This is a great step forward,” said Richard Barley, Director of Horticulture at Kew Gardens, UK. “By sharing information about the gardens and garden festivals of the world in an easily accessible way, we can start to increase awareness amongst all tourism stakeholders that plants, gardens and landscapes matter.”
(*) Benfield, R.W. (2013) "Garden Tourism". CABI, UK.
About IGTN
The International Garden Tourism Network was established in 2014 to encourage national and regional tourism organizations to promote garden experiences as a central part of their destination marketing activities. IGTN is membership-based and open to all interested parties.
About GardenTours.com
Based in the Netherlands, GardenTours.com provides consumers with an online travel guide to the world's best gardens, tours and garden events. GardenTours.com works in partnership with national and regional tourism organizations, garden owners, tour operators, event organizers and other stakeholders who wish to use digital media to market gardens, garden tours and horticultural events to consumers.
Ian A. Kain, GardenTours.com, http://www.gardentours.com, +31 621154727, [email protected]
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