The project, which is based on mutual respect and exchanged of ideas on sports and tourism, brought together lecturers and students from the University of Brighton in the United Kingdom and local communities.
Dr Marina Novelli, a reader in tourism and development, said they are with 40 students from sports and tourism, and many years, she has being teaching tourism to students who would eventually join the tourism industry in the UK.
It was also to remove some of the stereotypes that exist in many European students and try to give the students the opportunity to see what West Africa has to offer, she said.
The peer-to-peer initiative is to identify potential ways in which they could have tourism making a difference for the community, and to find what the communities could do for tourists.
She added that the ambition they had was to come not as volunteers, but to train trainer.
She said what they are committed to do, was to make sure what they left behind are people who could work in the industry and transfer the skills to others.
The initiative is getting big and for the past 8 years, they have a number of people in the course, she said, adding that they had 20 students coming in the Gambia and they sponsored 10 Gambians to be in the programme.
They were able to transfer some of the skills to them like business, marketing and others and at the end members are certified and they could used those certificates to work in the industry, she added.
Jack Sugden, PhD student on sports and international development, said they initially join the initiative as a result of links developed between the tourism of Brighton University, Sandele and Kartong.
He said football for peace is going in other countries like Israel and Palestine where they use sports, basically football to unite ethic groups.
They came to the Gambia recently as piloted last year on a small number of kids on methodologies and coaching skill they could teach them, he said.
The director of marking at The Gambia Tourism Board, Adama Njie, said with Ebola crisis on West Africa although the Gambia is not affected, but is also suffering it consequences.
He said this intuitive could be clear indication that the Gambia is Ebola- free, adding that the board and ministry are working on how to bring in more tourists in the country and assured his boards support to the initiative.
