Factory mainstream: what is missing for the development of industrial tourism
Experts recommended the creation of uniform regulations for access and security to industrial enterprises for tourists in the analytical report of the NGO "National Priorities" (Izvestia has it). They noticed that this area is far from being included in all regional development strategies, and in some cases there is a shift in responsibility for supporting industrial tourism. The experts of the National Priorities recommended creating a "national canon" for the presentation of such facilities, which could help create a showcase of the country's technological and scientific achievements. The Ministry of Industry and Trade and the ASI noted that some of these changes have already been implemented — there is a methodology for organizing industrial tourism, as well as a series of guidebooks. About how industrial tourism is developing in Russia — in the material of Izvestia.
What hinders industrial tourism
The National Priorities NGO recommended creating a "national canon" for the presentation of industrial tourism facilities in Russia in its expert and analytical report. As explained to Izvestia in the organization, we are talking about a list of recommendations for enterprises that could help them best show the advantages of a visit to this particular facility.
The emergence of a model by which industrial enterprises could demonstrate themselves would help overcome key constraints for industrial tourism, the experts of the report believe. These include poor promotion and marketing: industrial tourism programs are rarely included in federal and regional travel guides.
"Industrial tourism often faces an information vacuum," confirmed the expert of the report, Elena Kradinova, head of the Information and Exhibition Center of Pigment JSC. — Two years ago, we conducted a social survey and received the following figures: 79% of residents The Tambov region is aware of industrial excursions, but 85% do not understand how to get on them.
The development of this area is also hindered by factors of seasonality and uneven traffic: tours for school and student audiences and parents are "overheated" during peak seasons (summer, holidays), and traffic decreases significantly during other periods.
"This complicates the organization of processes and financial support for the existence of a tourist infrastructure," the report says.
The "national canon" for industrial and popular science tourism facilities could help create a kind of showcase of the country's technological and scientific achievements for both Russian and international tourists, the authors of the report note. In addition, proper presentation is also a contribution to career guidance, the formation of an understanding of production processes and working professions.
What else is the challenge for the development of industrial tourism
Industrial tourism still remains an area of vague responsibility in a number of regions, the report says. There is an "interdepartmental gap" in this area — tourism, education, industrial enterprises, as well as regional and federal authorities cannot always identify the responsible person or shift responsibility to each other. For example, industrial tourism is often absent from regional territorial development strategies.
"This slows down the development of projects at the stages of launch, approval and financing," the document says.
Other consequences of this out—of-sync include fragmentation of initiatives, duplication of functions, and the inability to plan long-term.
However, there is also an internal corporate gap: HR departments consider tourism as a career guidance tool, PR — as a way of forming an image, commercial services — as a sales channel.
Experts see the creation of a network of project offices in the regions serving as coordination centers as one of the ways to solve the problem. They can act as a link between various departments and stakeholders.
Tatiana Fedina, head of the Popular Science Tourism Development project at the MIPT Center for Educational Innovation and Technology, noted that there is a legal barrier that significantly limits the willingness of industrial facilities to accept schoolchildren, even if requested.
"Many enterprises are not ready to work with schoolchildren due to safety concerns, as there is a high risk of children violating the rules of staying at the facility and safety regulations," she said.
The basis is security
However, the very foundation of industrial tourism — enterprises — often become an obstacle to its development, analysts say. The factories were originally designed as work sites, not as tourist sites. Therefore, the presence of unauthorized persons on them creates risks of accidents, injury to visitors and shutdown of production processes.
Strict safety requirements are among the key constraints for the development of industrial tourism. In addition, the organization of tours requires lengthy coordination of routes and registration of admission for visitors. And the receiving party bears the operational costs of providing personal protective equipment, insurance, transportation and escort.
— The main difficulty in organizing industrial tours is the passage mode for groups at the enterprise. This requires careful planning: the group must be formed in advance. Therefore, sometimes it is more convenient to organize tours for schoolchildren and students through a tour operator — this ensures planning accuracy, which is difficult to achieve when working with individual visitors," said Ekaterina Solntseva, Deputy Chairman of the Government of the Nizhny Novgorod Region.
The authors of the report propose to introduce uniform standard admission and security regulations at enterprises open to tourists. They should take into account, among other things, the preparation of a mandatory package of documents and approvals with the labor protection service, mandatory insurance for each participant of the tour, and detailed safety instructions explaining the restrictions.
It is also recommended to create "clean zones" for routes without fail: these should be safe platforms — galleries, bridges, viewing areas. It is proposed to use glass partitions and special corridors to monitor the processes. In addition, dangerous areas should be replaced by alternative formats: demonstration layouts, VR technologies, museums and information centers.
As the Severstal press service told Izvestia, viewing galleries have already been created at the facilities of this company for the safety of tourists.
The report also provides an example of the Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works (MMK). Tourists are provided with personal protective equipment and must be insured (insurance is included in the ticket price), and guides are trained to create safe routes.
— We provide our tourists with work clothes: recognizable red jackets that distinguish the guests on the site, as well as trousers, boots and white helmets. The company's employees immediately see that there are visitors on the territory, and the guide will never lose them," said Maria Pushkarskaya, head of the All—Russian Competence Center for Industrial Tourism at MMK PJSC.
In all industries, the safety of people at work is one of the key priorities, this applies to both employees of enterprises and guests, Anna Trepalova, head of industrial tourism at TMK (Pipe Metallurgical Company), told Izvestia.
— It is possible to regulate the technical requirements for the content of the route: lighting, marking of special zones, protective fences, areas for photographing. In addition, a single regulation may relate to the use of protective equipment, the development and compliance with instructions on the safety of tourists, the control of the movement of the group and other parameters, she said.
Uniform rules would make routes really safe and convenient, which would increase the level of hospitality at factories in general, as well as have a positive impact on the image of enterprises, Anna Trepalova believes.
How is industrial tourism developing
According to the report, 17 regions are named as the leading regions in the development of industrial tourism by the end of 2024. These are the Amur, Belgorod, Vologda, Ivanovo, Kemerovo, Lipetsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Orel, Sverdlovsk, Tambov and Chelyabinsk regions, Moscow, Krasnodar, Krasnoyarsk and Stavropol Territories, Bashkiria and Crimea.
So, in 2024, according to the Agency for Strategic Initiatives (ASI), more than 2 million tourists visited industrial enterprises, the attendance of such facilities increased by 112% over the year, and the number of companies organizing such excursions increased by 53%.
ANO "National Priorities" also conducted a survey among users of Public Services and noted that a significant part of the respondents over the past three years have participated in excursions to industrial facilities (35%).
— Now people have an active demand for something real, "non-tourist", especially in the domestic market — this can be seen in the example of many cities and regions, — said Maya Lomidze, the expert of this report, Executive Director of the Association of Tour Operators of Russia (ATOR). — People want to be able not only to listen to the tour, but also to touch, look at, and get inside something. And industrial tourism is absolutely responding to this request.
At the same time, the companies confirm that the number of people willing to attend such excursions is growing rapidly.
"Over the past five years, the Severstal Metallurgical Industry Center has been visited by over 130,000 visitors from Russia and abroad," the company's press service said. — The center's team has already conducted more than 550 industrial tours. And interest in the format is growing in Russia.: This is an unusual type of sightseeing family leisure and an opportunity for career guidance for schoolchildren.
Anna Trepalova noted that the experience of developing industrial tourism in this company shows that despite the similarities of production chains and technologies at different enterprises, factory tours are based on different principles and approaches. There are no identical excursions, each company demonstrates certain successful practices.
Over the past few years, this process has become systematic due to the development of the ASI program "Open Industry", the expert said. She particularly noted the creation of a methodology for industrial tourism within the framework of this program — instructions for enterprises on how to set up this process, taking into account the interest of business and tourists. Later, a special ASI educational program appeared, which made it possible to train factory specialists.
— At TMK, more than 10 employees of various industries have completed this training — these are specialists who develop excursion routes. Our next step was to include industrial tourism in the company's Sustainable Development Strategy, as we consider this process as a contribution to the development of the regions of our presence," the expert said.
The ASI and the Ministry of Industry and Trade provided a common response to Izvestia's inquiries about the conclusions of the experts of the NGO National Priorities. It notes that during the five years of the Open Industry program, there has been a steady increase in interest in this area — the number of enterprises open to schoolchildren, students, tourists and the number of people who visit them is increasing.
"Over the five years of the program, we have covered 85 regions of the Russian Federation. There are about 2 thousand enterprises in Russia that implement industrial excursions on a regular basis in various industries: from metallurgy and mechanical engineering to folk arts and crafts and the production of children's toys and cosmetics," the response says.
The relevance of industrial tourism there was demonstrated by the example of the Perm Region: the growth of tourist traffic in this region increased 21-fold from 2020 to 2024, from 5,000 to 114,000 people.
Among the existing measures, the Ministry of Industry and Trade and the ASI drew attention to the work of competence centers for the development of industrial tourism. With their help, novice enterprises can learn from the leaders of industrial tourism. And to promote this direction, the guidebooks "All to the factory!" and "Two countries, thousands of factories" have been created.
They also noted that ASI has created a guide to the best enterprises open to the public. Its main goal is to make promotional tours as accessible and understandable as possible for a wide audience: from schoolchildren and families to tourists and specialists.
"In addition, the Ministry of Industry and Trade of Russia annually evaluates the effectiveness of regional executive authorities in the field of industry," the department noted.
This indicator takes into account the results of the participation of the region and enterprises in the accelerator of the Agency for Strategic Initiatives "Open Industry".
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