The global objective of this Call is to contribute “to improve rural livelihoods by promoting income- generating activities and making best use of local resources”.

The specific objective of this Call is to contribute to the ach ievement of the EU-JRDP expected result 6: “Ecotourism sector, including archaeological site, enhanced”.

The main expected outputs are:

i) Trail/path/dirt and gravel roads/routes system to connect exist ing eco-tourism attractions (including archeological sites) to generate tourism tours reinforced;

ii) Capacity building of local tourist authorities staff enhanced;

iii) Coordination and synergy between actors from economic and socia l bodies reinforced;

iv) Touristic promotional campaigns organized.

The EU-JRDP assessment made on April 2016 4 clearly indicated that, despite its great potential, the development of eco-tourism in Fayoum is seriously compromised b y the following constraints:

• Irregular tourists’ transportation facilities for land travel a t local level;
• Insufficient or inadequate road signs and illustrative display boards that help visitors to find and reach the archaeological and ecotourism sites;
• Rare and inadequate illustrative display boards available at th e sites and very often illegible;
• Missing informative material, bot h maps and brochures, at the d isposal of visitors in the hotels and at the field sites;
• Not exhaustive or not updated information on Internet;  Weak network of local operators for ecotourism;
• Local population not fully aware o f environmental degradation a nd of the negative impact that environmental degradation has at touristic level;
• Few and inadequate training opportunities for local tourism ope rators and local guides;
• Local associations for promoting local eco-tourism development not well structured and organized;
• Inadequate quality and quantity of toilet facilities and of con tainers for solid waste collection available on the touristic sites.

Another serious obstacle to tourism development is the badly de teriorated state of the roads (gravel, dirt, all- weather). Tourist Oriented Directional Signs (TODS) are also po or on these roads/trails/paths/routes.