The village of Vermosh in the municipality of Malesi e Madhe, northern Albania, has become the most sought-after and a stunning tourist destination, with the nature’s unsparing beauties complemented with the easily accessible infrastructure for visitors and the requalification of the village’s centre under the Urban Renaissance program.
The Vermosh’s centre has been radically transformed thanks to the government support through the Albanian Development Fund (ADF) under a rural and mountain tourism strategy initially launched in Valbona, Tropoja district, where the once ruined traditional alpine homes have been transformed into attractive guesthouses and inns to welcome local and international tourists.
Prime Minister Edi Rama, who has been visiting the country’s remote areas over the past two days, made a stopover in Vermosh’s new tourist centre, where a requalification project has preserved traditional architecture combined with modern construction elements. The transformed buildings offer not only information about the area of Malesi e Madhe, but also accommodation and traditional gastronomy. In the meantime, access roads have been built to ease access to a new little explored area.
At a meeting with residents and local government authorities, Prime Minister Edi Rama said this is the decade of the rural and mountain tourism that will transform Malesi e Madhe, Tropoja and entire north-eastern region of Kukes into a space of tourist development the country’s north has never experienced to this day in terms of intensity and income.
“I am very pleased to come back after a while to this remote area of the country and to this almost border corner of Malesi e Madhe, where the transformation already underway is impressive.
I am extremely pleased to have been provided the opportunity to award a medal of appreciation to four men from this area, who after years living and working abroad have decided to return back home and invest their savings right here. They have launched their rural tourism enterprises, providing a completely different vision on how an investment should further promote tradition and higher quality in tourism.
On the other hand, I am extremely pleased that the new tourist center of Vermoshi has now completed, just like the one in Valbona, which has been operating successfully for several months now. It is a center built on the ruins of two buildings, which simply stood on the ground unable to perform any function and were indeed the most direct expression of long years of neglect and abandonment. Not only symbolically, but the new centre is actually a place that will create a gravity for the area, as it won’t be merely a place for the visitors to sleep and eat, but a centre that through concerted efforts with the local government authorities and local residents will promote handicraft products, while working to organize an entire network of inns and guesthouses, because what I was discussing with my friends a bit earlier, the ones who have built four fantastic guesthouses, the today’s global trend is to make the best use of private family homes to build a network of guesthouses that are made available to visitors.
An international vacation rental system called Airbnb operates for this kind of tourism and the centre will help a lot to include all these guesthouses in the system and carry out entire online booking procedures.
On the other hand, we have finally completed the property transfer process, because the problem in Malesi e Madhe, Tropoja and other areas in Kukes, as well as in central Albania and even in south, but mainly in the country’s north, certain communities have not accepted and recognized the law No. 7501 on the land, because such legislation plunges them into conflict, while local residents have not been involve in no conflict of whatsoever on their land and property, as families in these areas have assumed their agricultural land according to the original borders of their properties in full understanding with each other, and in this way we can activate the chestnut forest massif in Tropoja that is currently being exploited by local residents without being issued property titles. They can also utilize their properties and land to develop agricultural and livestock farms, as well as to develop agritourism businesses.
I had same discussion with local residents and owners of guesthouses in Tropoja, who want to further develop and expand their businesses, but they lack the property titles. They have been provided with titles under the law N0. 7501, but such documents have not been useful to them. It has been an extraordinary long and legal debate and I believe it is a subject, about which I have hosted more meetings than any other topic over the years of my term in office of the Prime Minister, and a solution has been finally found, the relevant law has been adopted and the complementary legislation is being drafted.
Tropoja city council will convene to hand over the chestnut massif and distribute the land area to the families as they have all agreed, and the city council will act to draw a new topographical map of the property based on the accord between the local families there. When two neighbouring families do not dispute each other regarding the border of their properties, the area will be divided between the two and due property titles will be issued so that they can apply for funds from the Ministry of Agriculture, or the Agricultural and Rural Development Agency, because it is impossible to support anyone financially unless they show no property ownership certificate.
A river protection system has been built here to prevent the serious problems the river posed to the area previously. The same goes for the area up there.
So I believe that we are on the right track and I am convinced that this decade we are in will be the decade of mountain tourism, as coastal tourism has its own problems, but it is still discovered and is constantly developing, because it is already known worldwide as a major tourist destination. Mountainous Albania has yet to be explored, as it is still unknown and is increasingly becoming explored by local visitors, Albanian citizens who come from other parts of the country, but who never knew that they can be offered sightseeing and accommodation opportunities here. And it is only now they are finding out the accommodation opportunities in these little explored, but stunning areas, where the accommodation facilities and guesthouses are no longer merely sporadic cases. International tourists are also increasingly visiting these areas.
Albania’s mountain tourism featured the tourism adventure for years now, with more and more groups of visitors, mainly young mountain climbers and adventure tourism admirers, exploring these remote areas. Therefore, the number of accommodation structures and beds is constantly increasing. They are definitely welcome, yet this is not the sort, but only a component of the tourism we are seeking to develop here.
The kind of tourism is designed to turn these areas into luxury tourism destinations. We need to build this kind of tourism and the four new and admirable guesthouses recently built here are absolutely luxury tourism facilities for elite visitors and families who can afford longer stays. I see that more other tourism facilities and amenities are being developed in this area. I am convinced that commitment of local government authorities and our direct involvement to support and promote such investments has helped a lot. This is the main purpose of the urban renaissance projects. When we started the urban renaissance project in the village of Tamara, the latter was merely a point just like the many points affected by the acupuncture that energize the whole body and the area has been revived in all respects thanks to the growing number of visitors.
Some time ago, together with Tonin and Paulin, I visited former sports betting shop, but which has been transformed into a restaurant following the government decision to ban gambling. The owners keep now investing to expand their restaurant as the number of people visiting Tamara is increasing, especially on the weekends. But the project in Tamara served as key to clear the way for us to move further forward with other important projects.
Vermosh is a real nature wonder, as it has always been, but a huge change has taken place in terms of accommodation capacities compared to our previous visit, when we stayed one night only and only a small modest restaurant was operational back then. But a whole tourism industry is gradually taking shape here although it will certainly take more time to fully develop, but I am confident that this decade will turn Malesia e Madh, Tropoja and the entire north-eastern region of Kukes, along with its new airport, into a space of tourism development that the country’s north has never experienced to this day in terms of intensity and revenue.
Thank you very much all the people of the Albanian Development Fund who have made this change possible here. And for the record, so that nobody is taken by surprise, I have received another project that requires funding, as everyone now knows that applications for funding are no longer made through words, but through concrete projects. The handed over a four-kg project and I will hand over to you so that you review it once you come back to implement the urban renaissance project in Lepushe, another nature wonder of this area.
Thank you very much!
