While tourism has been, and continues to be, important to the local economy, it has not matched its potential. To remedy this and attract more tourists, local government and businesses in the city decided to ensure that the standard of services offered to visitors met internationally accepted standards

Rize has the best reserves of tea in Turkey, however, the SMEs in the Tea region is not qualified enough to compete. Hence, the general purpose of the project was to increase the competitiveness of the tea sector concentrated in Rize and its surroundings. More specifically, it wanted

The East of Turkey has had delayed progress compared to the economic development of other regions in Turkey. In this context, the Eastern Anatolia Development Programme was a regional development programme aimed at building capacity for sustainable development by implementing innovative and participatory local policy and planning approaches.

This project was a component of the Regional Competitiveness Operational Programme which is part of the Instrument for Pre-Accession and is designed to support Turkey’s convergence with the EU by increasing the competitiveness of the Turkish economy and reducing regional socio-economic disparities. The project was designed to provide