Eleven businesses from Kruševo already hold a green business certificate from the international organisation Green Destinations. Not eleven promises, not eleven memoranda of cooperation - eleven companies that went through an assessment and came out with a piece of paper that actually means something abroad.

That is a number worth measuring with a different yardstick: in how many Macedonian municipalities could you list the certified businesses and not end up at zero?

What was actually presented

The event in Kruševo showcased the process of certifying the town as a green destination, the work of the Kruševo Green association on reviving the Tourist Information Centre, the digital platform Experience Kruševo, and the announcement of improved waste management together with Pakomak. The public utility company will install a waste press for more efficient sorting.

Kruševo's private sector will present this story at the Green Destinations conference in Kranj, Slovenia.

Who is paying

None of this grew by itself. Behind the process stands the Swiss Embassy, through its Increasing Market Employability programme, which has been supporting Kruševo for more than a decade. According to what was said at the event, Switzerland has been working with Macedonia for thirty years and has invested around 370 million Swiss francs.

Mayor Čoneski says Kruševo proves that adventure, culture and sustainability can be combined into a single tourism product. Deputy Ambassador Harari recalled that Swiss support for Kruševo has been running for over ten years.

The question nobody asked at the event

The whole story is a good one - and that is exactly why one question is worth asking. When a foreign partner backs a single municipality for an entire decade to get it as far as certificates, a platform and a waste press, what is the domestic system doing in the meantime?

Kruševo is a small town with a big history and real tourism capacity. If the model works there, there is no reason it would not work in another ten municipalities. Unless the model is not a model at all, but one embassy that stayed in one place long enough.

The aim is for Kruševo to operate all year round, not only in season. That is the right ambition. What remains to be seen is whether it travels any further - or stays an example people talk about at conferences.