The conference that brings tourism back to the community: Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina brought together the region and the world around the idea of destination regeneration
The three-day international conference “Tourism for the Future”, held from March 18 to 20, 2026, in Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina, confirmed that the discussion on sustainable tourism in Croatia is increasingly moving toward concrete, locally grounded solutions. Organized by the tourist boards of Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina, under the patronage of the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, the event brought together experts, scientists, tourism professionals, and destination representatives from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia, and Mexico. In terms of format, content, and field-based approach, the conference differed from the usual professional gatherings: instead of a closed discussion in a single hall, participants were involved over three days in a kind of “conference in motion”, in which the future of tourism was discussed where tourism truly happens – on estates, in wineries, on walking routes, alongside local gastronomy, and within restored heritage.
The central theme was destination regeneration, a concept that has been entering European and global tourism discussions with increasing force in recent years. Unlike the classic understanding of sustainability, which is mostly reduced to minimizing harm, the regenerative approach starts from a more ambitious idea: that tourism must leave the space, the community, and the local economy in a better condition than it found them. That is precisely why the organizers built the conference on the intersection of theory and practice, bringing in internationally relevant speakers while also opening space for examples from Zagreb County and the wider region that show how such principles can be turned into a tangible development model.
From big words to tangible examples
Among the most prominent names at the conference was Anna Pollock, one of the world’s best-known advocates of regenerative tourism and founder of the Conscious.Travel initiative, whose work has strongly influenced the change in the way part of the tourism sector today thinks about destination development. Alongside her also participated Daniele Kihlgren, an Italian entrepreneur recognized for projects restoring historic and almost abandoned settlements through the model of so-called diffuse hotels, in which accommodation and the destination experience are not separated from the life of the place, its architecture, and its local identity. Also speaking were Irena Ateljević, a long-time professor and expert in regenerative development who in Croatia has dedicated herself to connecting agriculture, community, and tourism, then Romana Lekić, a member of the Scientific Council for Tourism at the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Katarina Miličević from Tourism Lab, Domagoj Jakopović Ribafish, Šaban Ibrišević, and other participants who opened questions of authenticity, heritage, local food, community, and the meaning of tourism growth.
It was precisely this combination of different experiences that gave the conference weight. Instead of repeating already familiar commonplaces about “green tourism”, the discussion focused on how destinations that are not under pressure from mass tourism can avoid the mistakes of major tourism centers and develop more slowly, more thoughtfully, and for the benefit of the local population. In that sense, the event in Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina was also a kind of message that the future of Croatian tourism does not necessarily have to arise only on the coast, but also in continental environments that have heritage, landscape, gastronomy, and a sufficiently strong sense of local identity.
A conference in motion as a message about a new development model
The special feature of the conference was precisely its format. The organizers did not want a classic professional gathering that remains closed within formal presentations, but an event limited to a scale that enables real contact, conversation, and shared experience. The director of the Tourist Board of the town of Sveti Ivan Zelina, Marinka Zubčić Mubrin, pointed out that the goal was to avoid “a big dry conference that is an end in itself”, and instead organize a “boutique” meeting, symbolically limited by the size of one bus. Such a concept proved successful precisely because it allowed participants to spend three days as a temporary community, in direct contact with the space they were talking about.
In the field, they toured the restored manors Omilje and Litterarii, walked the Dugo Selo Long Village Fitness Walk, got to know the indigenous kraljevina grape and the Zelina loparka pastry at the Kos Jurišić winery, took part in the heritage workshop Dugoselski spomenar, and visited the Kezele estate. In this way, the emphasis was placed on experiences that cannot be conveyed by presentation alone: restored architecture, landscape, local wine varieties, traditional food, and heritage interpretation became equal “speakers” of the conference. Such an approach also showed that destination regeneration is not a single individual investment, but a network of smaller, interconnected interventions involving the public sector, local producers, hospitality providers, cultural workers, and residents.
Participants were also presented with gastronomic elements of local identity. Traditional meals were prepared by Baranjac Marko Horvat, members of the Dugo Selo Sport Fishing Association, and chef Melkior Bašić. This is not a secondary detail, but an important message of the entire event: tourism that wants to be sustainable and regenerative cannot be built only on accommodation or promotion, but also on a local value chain in which food, drink, customs, and knowledge remain part of living everyday life, and not just a backdrop for visitors.
Why Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina are an important framework for this discussion
The choice of Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina as hosts was not accidental. In recent years, both destinations have been developing tourism projects ever more openly that rely on local resources, cultural and natural heritage, and a smaller, experiential form of travel. At the beginning of March 2026, Dugo Selo adopted a four-year Destination Management Plan, a document that connects tourism development with the preservation of natural and cultural assets, the quality of life of the local community, and the improvement of the visitor experience. Such documents are not in themselves a guarantee of change, but they show that destination management is increasingly being steered in a planned rather than improvised way.
Sveti Ivan Zelina, on the other hand, has already gained international visibility in the field of sustainable tourism. This destination entered among recognized global examples of sustainable practices within the Green Destinations initiative with the Zelina Chestnut Festival, and just a few days before the conference it was also announced that it had been included among the best-practice stories presented at ITB Berlin, one of the world’s most important tourism trade fairs. For the organizers, the conference was therefore also an opportunity to ensure that the international recognitions gained would not remain only at the promotional level, but would serve as leverage for further development and connection with other environments seeking a more sustainable tourism model.
On a symbolic level, the fact that the conference took place in the continental part of Croatia is also important, where tourism development is not yet as burdened by the problems of excessive growth as in some coastal destinations. Precisely for that reason, such environments have the opportunity to embed the principles of sustainability and regeneration into their plans earlier, instead of introducing them only when serious pressures on space, infrastructure, and the everyday life of the population appear.
Participants from the region and the world, but with an emphasis on local application
Around 60 participants from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia, and Mexico took part in the conference, and among the cities and places they came from were Ljubljana, Žalec, Sremski Karlovci, Novi Sad, Zenica, Coyoacán, Split, Brodski Stupnik, Klanjec, Oriovac, Tuhelj, Cavtat, Pleternica, Đakovo, Petrinja, Dugo Selo, Sisak, Gospić, Vrbovec, Vinkovci, Otočac, Oroslavje, Vukovar, Sveti Ivan Zelina, and Zagreb. This list is important not only as information about the international character of the event, but also as an indicator that the discussion on a different kind of tourism is being conducted in environments of very different sizes, identities, and development challenges.
It is precisely in such a composition that the additional value of the conference lies. Tourism in small and medium-sized destinations is often faced with similar questions: how to preserve authenticity, how to avoid local heritage becoming just decoration, how to connect food and wine producers with the tourism offer, how to manage growth without damaging quality of life, and how to offer the visitor an experience that is not generic. In that sense, the exchange of experiences among towns and municipalities from the region can be just as important as presentations by world-renowned experts, because it shows how good ideas are translated into real local models.
This is also confirmed by the reactions of participants after the end of the program. Irena Ateljević described the gathering as inspiring and sincere, emphasizing that on farms, in wineries, and in rural households participants saw how local food, wine, and culture can intertwine into authentic tourism experiences and that it is precisely in such places that “regeneration becomes real”. Đorđe Mihajlović from Novi Sad assessed that this was the best conference he had attended, while Ana Dražić from the Meridiana Slavonica Tourist Board singled out the warm and encouraging atmosphere, along with the feeling that participants share the same vision of tourism that is long-term sustainable, sincere, and beneficial to everyone.
From the word “sustainability” to the more demanding concept of “regeneration”
In recent years, international tourism policies have shown an increasing awareness that merely reducing negative impacts is no longer enough. Organizations and networks such as Green Destinations, as well as initiatives connected with UN Tourism, emphasize the importance of managing destinations in a way that includes the local community, heritage preservation, resilience to climate and economic changes, and the creation of long-term benefits for the space as a whole. Within that framework, regenerative tourism is emerging as the next step: not just less harm, but more real value for the place, the landscape, and the people who live there.
The conference “Tourism for the Future” sought precisely to bring this more demanding concept closer to the Croatian and regional context. This is especially important because the concept of sustainability is often used too broadly in public discourse, sometimes even as marketing, without clear criteria and without a real change in development logic. When regeneration is discussed alongside restored manors, wine roads, local workshops, traditional recipes, and small producers, it becomes clearer that this is not merely a new label, but an attempt to return tourism to the space and the community from which it arises.
This is precisely where the potential of such events lies. Croatian tourism has long been seeking a way to increase quality, reduce seasonality, and strengthen continental destinations. But such goals are not achieved only by a higher number of arrivals or overnight stays, but also by a different definition of success. In places such as Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina, success is increasingly measured also by how much local products remain part of the tourism experience, how much heritage is restored with respect for authenticity, how responsibly natural space is used, and how much residents see benefit in tourism rather than a burden.
Message from the organizers: the work does not end with the last day of the gathering
The director of the Tourist Board of the town of Dugo Selo, Karmela Vukov-Colić, said that the work does not end with the end of the conference and that all participants are going home with new ideas, new enthusiasm, and new connections that should result in a different way of thinking about tourism and good fruits in the future. This message is important because it shows that the event was not conceived as a one-off promotion, but as the beginning of a network of cooperation and knowledge exchange.
Such an approach also makes sense because of the broader international context. Regenerative tourism is not developed through one project or one slogan, but through a long-term process in which destinations test their own models, learn from the experiences of others, and adapt to local possibilities. With this conference, Dugo Selo and Sveti Ivan Zelina have shown that small and medium-sized destinations can be serious hosts of an international professional discussion, but also that their greatest strength is not in size, but in the ability to connect people, space, heritage, and experience into a whole that has developmental meaning.
That is also the most important message of the “Tourism for the Future” gathering. At a time when the tourism industry is increasingly facing questions of overburdened space, loss of authenticity, and pressure on local communities, the model presented by the organizers does not offer quick or easy solutions. It offers something more demanding, but more valuable in the long term: slower destination-building, reliance on local people and products, careful heritage management, and an understanding of tourism as a tool that should not consume space, but renew it. That is precisely why this conference goes beyond the framework of one successful event and becomes a signal that, in Croatia too, space is opening ever more seriously for a different tourism future.
Sources:- Tourist Board of the Town of Dugo Selo – official conference page with program, speakers, and basic information (link)- Tourist Board of the Town of Dugo Selo – conference announcement and confirmation of the patronage of the Ministry of Tourism and Sports (link)- Tourist Board of the Town of Dugo Selo – final publication on the held conference and participants’ reactions (link)- Tourist Board of the Town of Sveti Ivan Zelina – conference announcement and description of the goals of the event (link)- Town of Dugo Selo – events calendar with the date and venue of the conference (link)- Tourist Board of the Town of Dugo Selo – publication on the adoption of the Destination Management Plan of the Town of Dugo Selo (link)- Tourist Board of the Town of Sveti Ivan Zelina – publication on the Green Destinations Top 100 Story Awards and international recognition for sustainable practices (link)- Tourist Board of the Town of Sveti Ivan Zelina – publication on the nomination of Sveti Ivan Zelina and the Zelina Chestnut Festival for the Green Destinations Top 100 Story Awards (link)- Green Destinations – standard and framework for measuring and improving the sustainability of destinations (link)- UN Tourism – overview of sustainable tourism and destination development initiatives (link)- Tourist Board of the Town of Sveti Ivan Zelina – short video from the conference (link)
Find accommodation nearby
Creation time: 2 hours ago