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G18-O4 Tourism and Culture

Tracks
Refereed/Ordinary Session
Friday, August 30, 2019
11:00 AM - 1:00 PM
IUT_Room 104

Details

Chair: Tatsuaki Kuroda


Speaker

Prof. Tatsuaki Kuroda
Full Professor
Sugiyama Jogakuen University

An empirical study on domestic tourism in Japan

Author(s) - Presenters are indicated with (p)

Tatsuaki Kuroda , Kaifan Chen (p)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the situation in which the citizens of the regions have opportunities to travel domestically across the border of the other regions. It is an extension of our former theoretical work where the governments are assumed to serve as the source of funding for the improvements to the infrastructure of international tourism, including the areas of public facilities, natural areas, and artificial scenic construction. We examined the international competition in tourism, based on the concept of Nash equilibrium in the game theory. As an application of that, in this paper, we investigate the correlation between the regional tourism factors among the prefectures of Japan, by empirical analysis. We attempt to verify several hypotheses by the time series data verification. For example, without political and language factors in this case, small regions would be more likely to develop tourism. To some extent, in addition, we would confirm the attractive factors based on the concept of a gravity model. The number of visitors as well as consumption are analyzed by the model. For those small regions, our question is whether the impact of government spending for tourism should be larger or not. Also, we examine whether the differences in the growth rates of visitors across regions might be smaller and converged over time.
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Prof. Fabio Mazzola
Full Professor
Università di Palermo - DSEAS

Tourism and economic resilience in Mediterranean islands: a comparison with mainland regions

Author(s) - Presenters are indicated with (p)

Fabio Mazzola (p), Pietro Pizzuto, Giovanni Ruggeri

Abstract

In recent years local development has been more and more dependent from tourism sector especially in fragile contexts, such as islands, and in coastal cities which combine urban/cultural attractiveness with the increased demand for leisure.
The potential role of tourism on economic growth has been widely analysed in international literature. From this evidence, it is expected that tourism will play a compulsory role in leading growth and bringing economic opportunities especially for small island destinations, which require a special consideration with respect to the mainland regions. These territories, indeed, sometimes appear to be like as independent states in the regional system. Tourism often is the only policy option for these contexts to overcome the structural gaps imposed by the small size of their economies and the physical constraints which cause several disadvantages in terms of transport connection and supply destination. The resilience of the tourism sector may have played a crucial role in affecting the vulnerability and the recovery of regions from the recent economic crisis.
By using a panel of 84 Mediterranean regions for the period 2000-2014, we investigate the potential contribution of the tourism sector to economic growth and assess its role in affecting regional resilience to the recent crisis. Our aim is threefold. First, starting from the identification of a set of strategic territorial elements which affect economic growth, we analyze the relationship between the local characteristics of the tourism industry (in terms of both supply and demand as well as accessibility) and regional growth. Second, we control for regional characteristics by contrasting islands vis-à-vis mainland regions. Third, we test whether the crisis has changed the role of some specific determinants of growth.
We find that the tourism sector appears to be relevant for regional growth in the case of islands. However, its positive effects on regional growth, also after the outbreak of the Great Recession, seem to be not sufficient to offset the negative effects of the economic downturn since we detect a larger negative impact of the crisis on islands’ economic performances respect to mainland regions. Nevertheless, specific characteristics seem to be crucial in determining the ability of insular economies to react to shocks and recover from downturns.
Mr Meletios Andrinos
Other
University Of Thesaly

Exploring How Tourists’ Experiential Activities Affect Satisfaction, Memorability and Destination Image Modification of Tourists, the Case of Thessaly, Greece

Author(s) - Presenters are indicated with (p)

Meletios Andrinos (p), Theodore Metaxas , Marie Noelle Duquenne

Abstract

Memorable Tourists’ Experiences are maybe one of the strongest travel motivations in nowadays. Pine’s and Gilmore’s “Experience Economy” had a huge impact on all economic sectors including tourism. In nowadays, many touristic enterprises have shifted their interest and try to organize and offer staged experiences for their clients in order to diversify their products and/or their services and develop sustainable. The literature review identifies six attributes linked to tourist’s experiences: (i) Environment Aesthetics, (ii) Tourist’s Emotions, (iii) Tourist’s Experiential Participation, (iv) Tourists – Hosts Interaction, (v) Economic Value of the activity and (vi) Authenticity of the activity. The present study is the first attempt which examines how these attributes affect the tourist’s experience in the region of Thessaly, Greece. Moreover, is examined the linkage of tourists experience to their satisfaction and their memory. As a final step, is examined how tourists’ satisfaction and memorability affects (positive or negative) destination’s image modification. For this purpose, primary qualitative data was collected via online questionnaires that it was sent by e-mail in 409 incoming tourists, mainly, at least 1 month after their participation in experiential culinary activities (traditional Greek cooking lessons) in agrotourism enterprises in the region of Thessaly, Greece. Totally 215 valid questionnaires collected and confirmative Factor Analysis (CFA) using SPSS-AMOS software was used to test the hypothesized model and export all the result.
Prof. Margarida Perestrelo
Associate Professor
ISCTE-IUL

Creative tourism as a challenging proposal for peripheral territories: insights from an ongoing case study in Portugal

Author(s) - Presenters are indicated with (p)

Maria Gato, Margarida Perestrelo (p), Elisabete Tomaz, Ana Rita Cruz, Pedro Costa

Abstract

In many countries around the world, the tourism sector has been gaining particular relevance in the development of several cities and regions. However, it has also been raising several concerns about the negative impacts of the growth of these activities. In Portugal, several cities seek to benefit from the wave of tourist attractiveness that has been projecting the country in several international rankings. At the same time, rural areas and small sized cities try to find new tourist products as alternatives to counter the congestion and massification problems of the large metropolis tourism activity by developing creative initiatives based on tangible and intangible local projects.
For peripheral territories, such as rural areas or small sized cities, investing on creative-based tourism as a wide process involving artistic creation and the co-creation or accumulation of aesthetic and symbolic knowledge can be a good and complementary strategy for territorial enhancement. From a planning perspective, the idea of linking creative dynamics and tourism is generally supported by arguments such as: an opportunity for territorial, economic and social regeneration to diversify the structure of the tourism sector; to retain population and revitalize their cultural and social heritage; to enhance creative milieus and foster organic territorial dynamics, reflecting the “sense of place” and the unique and intangible characteristics of local communities (Richards & Wilson, 2006).
Thus, there is a growing interest in understanding how cultural and creative activities can drive the development of innovative and sustainable tourism solutions. The way tourists can be embedded in the local cultures to find out about place identities and explore the authenticity of local intangible heritage highlights the role of tourists as co-creators of knowledge and co-producers of experiences (Binkhorst, 2007), but also the active role that the host communities can (and should) play in the process.
Taking the CREATOUR project as an example — a project currently being implemented at national level in Portugal (Norte, Centro, Alentejo, and Algarve NUTS II regions) that aims to develop and pilot an integrated approach and research agenda for creative-based tourism in small cities and rural areas – this communication intends to present some results of this pioneering experience. The discussion will focus on the challenges of the co-creation process of places and cultural experiences and some expected impacts induced on territories and local communities where the creative-based tourism activities are being implemented.
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