What we found out

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Enogastronomy heritage, innovation, skill training, sustainability: these are the key words of TESTEAT.
The TESTEAT project was approved for funding during the Standard projects First call for proposals of the Cross-border Cooperation Programme Interreg V-A- Italy-Croatia, 2021-2027, which supports cooperation between European regions.
The project has a total budget of €2,302,840.50, mainly funded by the European Regional Development Fund (about 80%), with additional co-financing from project partners and national institutions.

The project is relevant in the Adriatic area as it aims to foster innovative and integrated cross-border tourism offerings by enhancing the Italian and Croatian enogastronomic heritage and by jointly training qualified professionals (chefs, waiters, destination managers, tour guides, etc.) in the tourism and enogastronomy sector.

Civiform Soc. Coop. Sociale (Cividale del Friuli, Udine) is the Project Partner 7 (PP7) we collaborated with for our civic monitoring.

Civiform's project objectives are:
• promoting zero waste and sustainability in food preparation;
• training students and future and current workforce;
• promoting digitalization and innovation;
• supporting the local economy and community.

Official data show:
• Total budget: €2,302,840.50 (about 2.3 million euros)
• Budget Civiform: €274,994,50
• Project duration: 1 February 2024 – 31 July 2026 (30 months)
• Number of partners: 8 partners (4 Italian and 4 Croatian institutions)

TESTEAT is included in the EU priority “Culture and tourism for sustainable development” and aims to promote sustainable tourism, digital skills, and circular economy in the food sector.
Specific objective: Strengthening sustainable tourism and culture
This means the project contributes to EU goals such as:
• sustainable tourism
• skills training
• circular economy
• digital innovation
• regional cooperation
The effective beginning of the project was reported as on 2 January 2024, while the end of project has not been published on the Italian website (https://opencoesione.gov.it/it/dati/progetti/h29i23001070006-ithr0200324/ ) ; it has been published on the related page of Civiform (https://www.civiform.it/prog/testeat/ ).

Foreseen activities

Actions
The project aims to develop the following activities:
• Mapping the food and wine heritage of the cross-border area and developing innovative tourism solutions to enhance the attractiveness of the target territory;
• Reskilling and upskilling tourism sector staff in order to foster socio-economic change in tourism by training both the future and current tourism workforce;
• Creating an integrated cross-border tourism offer to promote food and wine heritage by adapting it to modern tourism demand, in order to innovate, strengthen, and make the cross-border area more sustainable;
• Developing effective guidelines and action plans to enhance the intangible cross-border food and wine heritage and support policy change and sustainable development in the IT-HR area.
The project is structured into four Work Packages (Wps), each with specific activities and measurable outputs.
In particular, CIVIFORM has been involved in WP2 – Skills Development and Training
The main output is the Joint Training Program, a shared curriculum designed to standardize skills across the Adriatic area.
Concrete deliverables (outputs) include:
◦ 39 training modules organized by competence levels.
◦ A 115-page technical manual with the guidelines to conduct the training, which covers all the aims of TESTEAT project : Sustainability, Circular Economy & Zero Waste, Adapting Restaurant Offerings to Consumer Needs and Digitalisation.
◦ Training of more than 50 teachers.
The activities of training teachers/professionals and students involved courses, workshops and training camps.
The link to Testeat website
https://www.italy-croatia.eu/web/testeat/library#d212virtualhybridcoursefortheteacherstrainers_com_liferay_journal_content_web_portlet_JournalContentPortlet_INSTANCE_pubz

shows the training modules published.
The training activities CIVIFORM organised were as follows:
• three courses for teachers and teacher trainers;
• twelve courses for current and future workforce, involving four partners, each of which was allocated three courses;
• workshops for students;
• three Cross-border Exchange camps for students (duration: 3 days each);

In the monitoring phase, it was important to verify:

◦ Whether the modules are actually implemented in teaching activities.
◦ How many students and teachers are involved.
◦ Whether the training has measurable effects on employability
◦ Evidence of training (outputs, websites, social media, programs).

All the objectives were succesfully achieved as teachers themselves were also trained following the aims and key stages of Testeat.
As for employability of workforce, it needs to be specified that most of the students are still attending the school at Civiform, so data related to this aspect cannot be collected yet.
The initial project had specified a minimum of 45 attendants to the courses, a result that has been successfully achieved, since 52 people had completed the courses and additional data on attendance were expected.
Civiform also contributed to the online tool which is being implemented and shows events, activities and a digital library
One of the recent outputs was the organization of the event ‘Radici di Gusto: Terra, Sapori e Comunità’ (Roots of Taste: Land, Flavours and Community)”, which was held at Civiform in Cividale on 17 January 2026.
https://www.italy-croatia.eu/web/testeat/dettaglio?articleId=27514559&groupId=3628024
On the whole, TESTEAT partners organized more than 43 events from February 2024 to February 2026, with some which are still being finalized.

Project origin

The project TESTEAT was selected for funding in response to the first Call for Proposals for Standard Projects launched by the Interreg Italy‑Croatia Programme. This Call opened on 28 November 2022 and closed in early 2023.
https://programming14-20.italy-croatia.eu/web/it-hr-interreg-2021-2027/1st-call-for-proposals?
The Lead Partner of TESTEAT is the Agency for Rural Development of Istria
https://www.azrri.hr/ , while the other partners of project are the following:

1. City of Venice - Italia
2. Juraj Dobrila University of Pula - Croatia
3. Ca’ Foscari University of Venice - Italy
4. Municipality of Ston – Croatia
5. Scuola Centrale Formazione - Italy
6. CIVIFORM - Italy
7. Dubrovnik Development Agency DURA – Croatia
All the partners have been involved in the project planning and management of activities.
The Kick-off meeting was held in Pula (Croatia), where TESTEAT project was presented and its Wps defined.
Constant SWOT workshops were held in Croatia and Italy from the beginning of the project (October 2024) and further meetings in both countries.
Additionally, the project has been promoted at Friuli Doc, an international enogastronomic event in Udine; "Artistica", the international culinary event set in Jesolo; Your Seat at the Table: Join the TESTEAT HUBs Today!; Dubrovnik welcomes ‘Days of Taste”; Monitoring Committee Study Visit.
The complete list of events, study visits, workshops can be found at the link
https://www.italy-croatia.eu/web/testeat/news-events?p_p_id=ItaCro2127SearchMainPortlet&p_p_lifecycle=0&p_p_state=normal&p_p_mode=view
None of the stakeholders and the addressed subjects has been excluded from the project both during project planning and during project implementation.

Beneficiaries

The primary beneficiaries include tourism professionals: current workers in the field, including chefs, waiters, destination managers, and tourist guides; there are also students in tourism, hospitality, or economy-related fields.
Public and Private Stakeholders: involve local governments, tourism boards, cultural institutions, and private businesses in the Italy-Croatia border area. These actors collaborate within "enogastronomic innovative HUBs" to create integrated tourism.
Local communities, businesses and small-scale producers/companies might benefit from the “HUB” as they were consulted and involved in the project (e.g.: local agricultural farms provided ideas for the menus, for the recipes and supplied Civiform with local products).

Context

The TESTEAT project is a strategic response to specific socio-economic challenges within the Adriatic cross-border area. Its funding is justified by the need to transform traditional tourism models into more resilient, sustainable, and integrated systems.
The Italy-Croatia region faces several structural pressures that threaten its long-term economic stability; they are seasonality, in that seaside tourism leads to overcrowding in summer and reduced presence of tourists during the off-season; another aspect lies in the fact that local products do not reach the tourism market; the workforce and small enterprises in the hospitality sector find it hard to adapt to digital transformation and the increasing demand for sustainable, circular tourism practices.
TESTEAT is not an isolated project in the area, as it is a part of EU strategy to integrate border areas with a focus on the European Green Deal and the Farm to Fork Strategy, which highlights fo "zero waste," circular economy in the kitchen, and low-impact food production.
The project moreover is connected to the general tourism policy of region Friuli Venezia Giulia, specifically through PromoTurismoFVG, which emphasizes sustainable enogastronomy and tourism in less crowded areas (Piano Strategico di Marketing Turistico).

Progress

TESTEAT is expected to end in July 2026.
We specifically monitored the actions carried out by Civiform in Cividale del Friuli (Udine), responsible of WP2 (Training of staff and students).
The information that we collected derives from Open Coesione (related to funds allocated), Interreg Italy-Croatia website and TESTEAT website https://www.italy-croatia.eu/web/testeat , where we found a lot of information about the actions and events planned and already concluded, the partners and the stakeholders involved. Civiform website also provided us with some data (https://www.civiform.it/prog/testeat/ ).
We then read some programme documents in the above websites; apart from that, we conducted two visits of civic monitoring at Civiform.
During the first, we took part at en event "Radici nel futuro" talking with Civiform Director Ms. Chiara Franceschini and a local producer; in the second monitoring visit we interviewed a chef (Mr Michelutti), involved in the training program, and two project managers (Ms Castiglione and Ms Michelutti).
We had various talks with Mr Costa from ISTAT FVG on how to implement infographics and additional data. We also searched for some information on the website of Regione Firuli Venezia Giulia, related to tourism and its impact.

Results

The project TESTEAT carried out by the partner Civiform is almost concluded. The results we were particularly interested in were related to the sector Training and Occupation, but we think this denomination is only partial, since Civiform fully intergated all the other aims of TESTEAT in its action and output, and it is actually classified in the Interreg Italy-Croatia 2021-27 as belonging to SO Culture and tourism for sustainable development -
SO 4.1 - Culture and sustainable tourism although in OpenCoesione the theme is "Occupazione e lavoro".

As we found by analyzing the information in the documents (Testeat website, Interreg Italy-Croatia, Civiform website) , the project is a complex one. The aim of WP2 (training staff and students) has been achieved, as the training packages (training models) and training courses for both teachers and students reached a number of participants over the minimum number required (45) - participants were 52, although some partners still need to send the complete data (source: Civiform Project Managers). The courses were replicated not only at Civiform but also to other partners. The WP2 in charge of Civiform also involved local stakeholders( small-scale farms and food producers, agricultural restaurants) which probably is the main challenge of the whole project. In fact, Civiform also conducted interviews and some research in order to understand the local needs of stakeholders before planning the actions of the project.
The activity of training has also included a less formal series of workshops and three Exchange Camps of students, both in Italy and Croatia, where students had the opportunity to apply what they had learned.

Risks

One of the main risks of TESTEAT is the gradual loss of interest in the actions the project started because of lack of funds.
Another risk might be related to the employability of trained students; despite the innovative Testeat training module of workforce in enogastronomy, some of the areas where partners are located are not major tourist sites. Testeat partners might find it difficult to continue some activities devised by the project as these were not "physical", that is, a school, a building, a cycling path which has been financed and is visible.
The actions Tetsteat planned are mostly not as visible as structures but involve education, culture, strategies to foster reskilling and upskilling, whose results are not immediately visible.

Investigation method

How was the information collected?

• Web research
• Visit to the project's location, documented by pictures or videos
• Interview with people responsible for the project's planning
• Interview with the users and/or final beneficiaries of the intervention
• Interview with other types of people
• Interview with people responsible for the project's implementation

First of all we contacted the people in charge of the project TESTEAT at Civiform (Cividale del Friuli): the Director of Civiform, Ms Chiara Franceschini; Ms Michela Castiglione (Testeat Project Manager, Coordinator of International Cooperation at Civiform), Ms Stefania Michelutti (Project Manager at Civiform, TESTEAT Project Activities Coordinator), Mr Amorino Michelutti (Chef and Teacher at Civiform, Subject involved by the TESTEAT action "Staff training").
We also consulted Dr Roberto Costa, from ISTAT (National Institute of Statistics - Friuli Venezia Giulia), who collaborated by giving us some important insights about civic monitoring in general, and helped find some relevant context data.
In the end, we tried to contact one of the local producers which took part at one of the Testeat events, but we did not receive any replies.

Main questions

1. What are the main objectives of Testeat project at Civiform? (Ms Michela Castiglione and Ms Stefania Michelutti, Testeat Project Managers, Civiform)

2. What are the most important topics covered during the phase of students training and how will they impact in their future career? (Ms Amorino Michelutti, trainer and chef teacher, Civiform)

Main answers

1. Testeat as implemented at Civiform has four main specific objectives. The first one is to map the current enogastronomy heritage and to develop an innovative framework for the integrated tourism offer of the cross-border area Italy and Croatia. The second specific objective is to start the socio-economic change by upskilling and reskilling the present and future tourism workforce. The third objective is to valorize the enogastronomy heritage adapted to the modern customer choices and needs to innovate and make more sustainable the Italy-Croatia cross-border area. And the fourth objective of our project is to support the policy change and sustainable development of the cross-border area by building guidelines and develop some action plans aimed at enhancing the intangible cross-border heritage. This project aims at improving the food and wine tourism offer as a way of a sustainable tourism together with a specific attention to training young people to work in this sector.

2. The most important aspect is knowledge. It is important to guide students step by step to understand the different needs that people can have.
These needs can be medical, social, or religious. If there is no awareness, it is difficult to understand and respond to these needs.
For this reason, it is important to start with theoretical training. After that, students should also have practical experience in the field. In this way they can slowly learn how to manage different situations.
For example, one important topic is gluten-free food. Students need to learn how to use the right ingredients, how to recognize them, and how to avoid contamination.All these things together are part of the training of a student.