The Way of Sant James

The Director of Tourism of Galicia, Nava Castro, stated that the Camino de Santiago Awards are of the utmost importance for the recognition of the public and private initiatives aimed at  conserving and improving the Camino de Santiago routes. The Director made these declarations at the presentation of the second edition of the awards held in the Cidade da Cultura.

Nava Castro explained that the Camino is highly recognised internationally and that the Government of Galicia wishes to distinguish those who carry out work which favours the good state of the Jacobean route, which welcomed more than 277,500 pilgrims in 2016, 6% more than in the same period the previous year.

These rewards constitute the institutional and social acknowledgement of the public and private initiatives aimed at conserving, improving and embellishing the environments of the routes of the Camino de Santiago, this which foster new services or innovation and improvement of the services provided to the pilgrims, as well as the specific dissemination and promotion of the Camino de Santiago and Jacobean culture.

Thus, the main objectives of these awards are to make progress in the improvement of each one of the routes of the Camino de Santiago as well as in their landscape and architectonic environments and their protection in general together with revitalising them.

Moreover, they seek to increase the sensitivity of the citizens as regards the relevance of the values of the Camino de Santiago and foster the knowledge of the general heritage of the Camino by promoting citizen collaboration in coordination with the Public Administrations.

The  Award Winners
In the first category, aimed at distinguishing the initiatives of the Town Halls located on the routes of the Camino de Santiago, the first prize was for the Town Hall of Mondoñedo and the second fr the Town Hall of Oroso.

The second category, designed to award the action carried out by the Friends of the Camino de Santiago, recognised the work of the Association of Friends of the Camino de Santiago of Burgos, the first prize, and the Jacobean Association of Malaga.

In the third category, which recognises the initiatives or activities carried out by small and medium sized enterprises, the first prize was for Maseybuco and the second for Zerozero Imagen y Comunicación.

Finally, the fourth category prize was for the Centre for Galician Studies at the University of Kiel, in the modality which distinguishes research and study work on the Camino de Santiago and the Jacobean pilgrimage or culture or the cultural heritage linked to the Camino de Santiago, and  the San Rosendo-Mondoñedo Multilingual Secondary School, in the category which recognises the work of an educational nature related to the theme of the Camino de Santiago carried out in primary and secondary education centres in the Autonomous Community of Galicia.

At this second convening of the Camino de Santiago Awards, Turismo de Galicia assigned a total of €75,000 for the eight distinctions conferred. In the first, second and third categories the winners received a prize amounting to €15,000 and those in second place received €5,000. The winners in the fourth category €10,000 euros in the research and study modality and €5,000 in the category of work of an educational nature.

Master Plan of the Camino
Nava Castro also stressed that the Government of Galicia has already executed 60% of the Master Plan of the Camino approved last year for the 2015-2021 period with a sum amounting to 60,000,000 and includes a total of 26 plans of action and 85 initiatives to be fostered for the improvement of the Jacobean Route.

Among these actions already executed or commenced, the Director highlighted the creation of hostels in A Fonsagrada and in the city of Ourense, as well as work on the improvement of many public hostels in order to guarantee accessibility and the implementation of the WiFi service in the Public Network of Hostels.

In this regard, Nava Castro also praised the Signposting Order for the adaptation of several Jacobean Routes to the official delimitations, the Plan of Action on the Monte del Gozo, the start-up of the Road Safety Commission for the Camino de Santiago, in collaboration with the Government Delegation in Galicia, and the creation of the Chair of the Camino de Santiago and Pilgrimage in collaboration with the University of Santiago and the Cathedral of Santiago,  a financing agreement signed yesterday.