Annie Tubadji (p)

Silvia Cerisola

Cultural heritage is clearly a massive element of economics of tourism and clearly one of the main contributors to tourism led growth. The case of Italy or France or the areas in proximity of the Great China Wall are examples that need little explanation or defense as case studies. However, we all know about the role of carrying capacity in overpopulated touristic areas. Culture Based Development has devised and employs the notion of cultural entropy, that demonstrates how the impact from tourism on economic growth depends on a balanced use of cultural heritage. The paper uses regional data for China for the period 2013 - 2019. The results demonstrate the power of cultural entropy to modify the overall cultural bias on regional development across the Chinese regions.

Maria Giovanna Brandano (p), Martina Dal Molin

Annie Tubadji

In recent years tourism is evolving and tourists’ preferences are changing. According to the UNWTO (2023) after COVID-19 tourists prefer open-air activities, nature-based products, and rural tourism more than in the past. However, the pandemic event exacerbated a trend that was already in act. Indeed, slow tourism and every form of sustainable tourism started to evolve during the 1990s.
In this context, growing attention is given to the walking routes, a niche of slow tourism. This specific kind of tourism is particularly relevant in Italy, where the Cultural Ministry proclaimed the 2016 as “Year of the Cammini” intending to enhance the rich heritage composed of the network of Cammini – historical, naturalistic, cultural and religious – that, from north to south, cross the country representing a slice, perhaps little known but fundamental in the Italian slow tourism offer.
The aim of the present paper, based in Italy, is to analyse for the first time if these walking routes are a driver for the socio-economic development of the destinations in which these “cammini” pass through, by mapping their presence at the provincial level. Our main hypothesis to be tested is that the presence of a walking route in a province could generate a positive impact both in terms of tourism increase (for the demand and the supply side) and, at a more general level, for the economic development of these provinces. To achieve this research objective multiple data are used: specific data on the Italian “cammini” (geographical routes, year of start, whether it is spiritual or not), ISTAT official data concerning the number of tourist arrivals and accommodation, and GDP at the provincial level.

Silvia Emili (p), Cristina Bernini, Federica Galli

Maria Giovanna Brandano

The European Commission and Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises describe creative and cultural industry (henceforth CCI) as an ecosystem that “represents approximately 3.95% of EU value added and employs around 8 million people, including around 1.2 million firms, over 99.9% of which are small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs)” (EASME, 2016). CCI means all sectors whose activities are based on cultural values and/or artistic and other creative expressions, covering architecture, archives and libraries, artistic crafts, cultural heritage, design, music and many other sectors. The industry represents a clear example of economic system profoundly influenced by complex relationships and dependencies arising from multisectoral and multiproduct production processes, spatial phenomena such as agglomeration and clustering and contextual and physical factors characterizing the area where production occurs.
This study aims to identify and measure spillover effects among interconnected industrial sectors characterizing CCI by disentangling the effects originating from both inter and intra sectoral relationships within a specific area and between neighbouring territories. To address this objective, starting from EASME classification and results of Input-Output analysis, we identify the main actors of the Italian CCI industry. Then the production functions are estimated using data for the period 2013-2022, collected at the Labour Market Area level of aggregation, by means of a system of dynamic spatial panel data models (Yang and Lee, 2019) characterized by endogenous interdependencies. The proposed approach allows considering separately the production functions of the interrelated sectors composing CCI system. Each sector’s output is modelled as a function of (i) production inputs, (ii) simultaneous relationships between sectors’ performances, (iii) past performances of the same and related sectors, and (iv) the current and past performances of the same and related sectors in neighbouring areas.
The insights derived from this research can offer valuable information to policymakers for designing economic plans for industries, shedding light on interdependence features within diverse sectors that define the complexity of CCI industry.

EASME (2016). Boosting the competitiveness of cultural and creative industries for growth and jobs – Final report.

Yang, K. and Lee, L.-F., (2019). “Identification and estimation of spatial dynamic panel simultaneous equations models”. Regional Science and Urban Economics, 76, 32-46.

Silvia Cerisola (p), Elisa Panzera

Silvia Emili

This paper is part of a research project that aims at identifying policy suggestions meant to promote a cultural tourism that is sustainable in terms of its socio-economic impacts, with the final objective of fostering local economic development.
Drawing on the concept of carrying capacity (UNWTO, 2018) and exploring it within an optimal city size theoretical framework (Alonso, 1971), the present work originally aims at investigating the local sustainability of tourism flows in Italian municipalities. Particularly, we follow Camagni et al. 2013, and, in operational terms, we augment the optimal city size theory to consider touristic flows and the possible related congestion issues. In addition, we deepen our research by taking into account local specificities in terms of cultural touristic vocation (ISTAT, 2022) and heritage endowment.
Therefore, the two main innovative aspects of the proposed paper are the following: first, the optimal city size framework is originally used to explore tourism and overtourism topics; second, the empirical analysis is carried out at the municipal level, which allows an extremely granular spatial disaggregation enabling to gain a deeper understanding of the peculiarities of different local contexts.

Alonso W. (1960), A theory of the Urban Land Market, in “Papers and proceedings of the Regional Science Association”, 6, pp. 149-47.

Camagni R., Capello R., Caragliu A. (2013), One or infinite optimal city sizes? In search of an equilibrium size for cities, Annals of Regional Science, 51, pp. 309-341

Istat (2022), Classificazione dei Comuni in base alla densità turistica come indicato dalla Legge 17 luglio 2020, n. 77, art. 182, https://www.istat.it/it/files/2020/09/classificazione-turistica-comuni.Istat_.pdf, accessed 30 January 2024

UNWTO (2018), ‘Overtourism’? – Understanding and Managing Urban Tourism Growth beyond Perceptions, https://www.e-unwto.org/doi/pdf/10.18111/9789284420070, accessed 30 January 2024