Last Monday 31st May, members of PREIT-Tour visited the Economuseo del Sombrero and the Rural Parishes of Baños and Sayausí in the framework of the Project Fostering a platform for research-based education to support sustainable development through Tourism in the Cajas Massif Biosphere Area (CMBA). The objective of the visit was to gather information to create a short documentary video describing the cooperation and bonding work carried out by different actors throughout the two years of the project. In this case, Gabriel Yanza joined this initiative, who will be in charge of producing and directing the documentary that will be screened in Belgium in the last quarter of this year.
For Gerardo Machado (Director of the Economuseo), this initiative is an excellent opportunity to publicise the work of the hat weavers abroad and to raise awareness of the cultural importance of the Toquilla Straw Hat for Cuenca society. For her part, Esthela Loja (Director of the Tourism Department of the GAD de Baños) assured that the recording of these spaces is beneficial to spread the work of the artisans of the parish, who have been ignored for many years. Similarly, for the members of the Sayausí Rural Tourism Association, this activity will help the inhabitants of the parish to publicise their tourism-related enterprises.
The technical visit to these territories is part of the pre-production of the documentary, which will begin to be filmed in the coming weeks in order to disseminate the results of the project thanks to the cooperation between the University of Cuenca, the VLIR-UOS Programme and the University of KU Leuven.
Photo credits: Byron Alvarado Vanegas
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