On 9 June TC Lipa cave organized the Large scale event of Adriaticave Plus project. The conference was held at the premises of Gradska kafana in the Old Royal Capital Cetinje. The event was attended by Lipa cave’s associates, valuable experts in the fields of speleology and biospeleology, representatives of both national and local government, and students of tourism high school. The partners from other countries and stakeholders who could not attend in person participated remotely via Zoom.

The deputy director of TP Lipa cave, Mrs. Milena Raičević, gave a welcome speech, introducing the project and the speakers at the conference. The first speaker was Mis. Kana Tomašević, the Head of the Directorate for the first level of control of the Ministry of Finance, who generously offered the Ministry’s support regarding the participation in projects such as ADRION is.

A professor at the University of Ljubljana and an expert in the field of sustainable development and tourism, Mrs. Ljubica Knežević Cvelbar, gave a thorough insight in the impact of tourism on the world today and reminded about the need for sustainable development. She presented the alarming data concerning the state of both natural and social environment, turning attention to the necessity for activating environmental and social components of sustainable development in the sector of tourism.

Armando Fizzarotti, the coordinator of Adriaticaves Plus project gave a fine presentation of the project itself. He explained that Adriaticave Plus was the extension of the project Adriaticaves the implementation of which was affected by COVID pandemics.

The first project lasted from 2018 to 2021 and the goals were to establish Adriaticaves brand, develop an action plan for the improvement of cave management and conservation, the establishment of a network of speleoguides and experts, and the development of Charter of Caves strategy. The goals of Adriaticaves Plus project were the development of 3D reconstruction of caves and evaluation of the experiment, dissemination of Charter of Caves and valorization of Tourism Packages. At the end of his presentation Mr. Fizzarotti presented the results of the Adriaticaves Plus project.

The second part of the conference was dedicated to speleological resources of Montenegro. The professor at the University of Montenegro and an expert in the field of speleology, Mr. Goran Barović, provided the information about the most valuable geological formations in Montenegro, while Vladimir Pešić, also the professor at the University of Montenegro and an expert in cave biodiversity, presented the results of the research of Lipa cave biodiversity and provided astounding information about endemic species that can be found nowhere else in the world. This research was done within the Adriaticaves project.

As for other funding opportunities under the IPA ADRION program, they were presented by the National Contact Point in the Ministry of European Affairs for the ADRION program, Miloš Marković. During his presentation, he stated the areas of interest of ADRION project and encouraged future cooperation.

The third part of the conference opened with the presentation of Old Royal Capital’s tourist potential which was done by the director of the Tourist Organization Cetinje, Mr. Oskar Huter. He stated both potentials and challenges the municipality has to deal with in order to increase tourist visits in line with the development strategy.

The Large scale event conference concluded with the presentation of the „Charter of Caves“ project. The presentation was done by Milena Raičević, Communications Manager within the Adriaticaves Plus project. She spoke about the project itself and reminded about European standards regarding cave management. She presented the programs for visiting caves, tourist packages and the Book of Caves as a deliverable containing valuable information about the caves managed by project participants. Stressing the importance of the preservation of caves as unique ecosystems Mrs. Raičević thanked everyone for excellent cooperation during the project and closed the conference.

All the participants and attendees of the event were handed the printed leaflets with the information about the Adriaticaves project and basic information about caves and tourist packages offered by the companies managing them.