"Plovdiv 2019" Foundation with changes to the Establishment Act and a new three-year work programme

The foundation's priorities are attracting European and national funds for the creative cultural sector and developing festival tourism in the city

At the upcoming municipal session, the deputy mayor of ‘Culture, Archeology, and Tourism’ Plamen Panov will introduce changes in the structure of the ‘Plovdiv 2019’ Foundation, with which it will have the opportunity to work on key projects and programmes for the city over the next three years. The Foundation which prepared and accomplished the project for the first Bulgarian European Capital of Culture will focus its efforts on a programme related to the international image and economy of Plovdiv. It will also continue to work on the sustainability of key events for the city and the region and ensures income to the local economy.

The three-year framework enables the foundation to apply for international and national programmes and develop its network abroad. In addition, Plovdiv 2019 will be the main partner of the biggest festivals in the country. It will also be a beneficiary under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan in order to create a new cultural programme. Nearly BGN 4 million will be needed by the municipal structure for the next three years in order to successfully continue its activities related to the development of cultural tourism and major events.

Despite the Covid-19 crisis of the last two years, the foundation's team won three international projects for over BGN 700,000 through its established networks and contacts among the European capital of culture network. Due to them, the international cultural management academy Cultart was created and dozens of training for volunteers from all over the world. At the moment, the foundation prepares two project proposals directly for Brussels as a leading organization.

For the previous two years, due to the ‘Melina Mercouri’ award, ‘Plovdiv 2019’ distributed BGN 3 million under the ‘Legacy’ programme, with which more than 120 projects and events in Plovdiv were supported during the Covid-19 crisis. Also, in this period the foundation initiated the first national programme for supporting talented students abroad, as well as a Crisis Fund for Plovdiv artists at the beginning of the pandemic of Covid-19. 

This year's Opera Open festival will reach the scale of the festival during the year of the ECoC title, especially with Orpheus and Eurydice the most-watched spectacle in the programme, seen by nearly 4,000 people in 2022. Opera Open is one of the first projects supported by the foundation, as a priority in the international programme for audience development. In the middle of the 2022 season, reports from online sales indicate that more than 30% of the audience is international, with guests from Serbia, North Macedonia, and tourists from France and Spain.

The Hills of Rock festival, specially created for the programme of Plovdiv - European Capital of Culture, after a two-year hiatus, returned to The Rowing Channel in 2022, where, according to unofficial statistics, it was visited by more than 20,000 people only on the first day. According to experts' data, for the three days of the event, revenues of nearly BGN 8 million came into the tourism industry of Plovdiv. The same ranking in the city cultural calendar has the new electronic format - SOLAR. More than 10 thousand people came for the participation of the top 3 DJs in the world, Armin van Buuren.

With the change of the Establishment Act of ’Plovdiv 2019’, the Municipal Council of Plovdiv will guarantee additional funds from European and national funds for culture and will confirm the leadership position of Plovdiv in festival tourism. Cultural tourism is becoming an increasingly important part of the tourism sector in the region and generates tens of millions of BGN in the local economy.

Plovdiv is now a year-round tourist destination. The overall cultural product, including the sites in the Old Town, the only district of creative industries ‘Kapana’, the largest modern museum in the country  ‘The Bishop Basilica of Philippopolis’ and the hundreds of events make Plovdiv a place with a sustainable tourist flow.