Luca Simone RIZZO, Università e-Campus, Italy
Raffaela Gabriella RIZZO, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di Milano, Italy
Antonella TRABUIO, Supporto statistico per lo sviluppo rurale - Direzione AdG FEASR Bonifica ed Irrigazione, Regione Veneto, Italy
The tourist route concept refers to initiatives that combine activities and attractions under a single theme and stimulate business opportunities by developing products and services, in accordance with the cultural context and the interaction with the territory.
The above has sparked debate, engaging researchers, socio-economic and cultural actors, and political institutions at various levels. Rural development policy serves as a good example: although not intended to promote tourism in itself, it also encourages the creation/rediscovery of thematic tourist itineraries of different types: cultural or natural.
We undertook an exploratory case study in north-eastern Italy. Using a mixed research method (quantitative, qualitative, GIS-based), we aimed to better appreciate the role played, within the EU RDP of the Veneto region, by tourism and by the tourist itinerary as a tool for territorial valorisation.
Our first objective was to identify the correlations between the choice of certain types of tourism interventions and the territorial characterization by tourism. By performing a correspondence statistical analysis, two autonomous analyses on the funding beneficiaries were carried out on the programming periods 2007-2013 and 2014-2020, depending on whether the issuing organization was the Veneto Region or a Local Action Group.
The types of intervention focusing on information and infrastructures for tourism as well as on the redevelopment of cultural heritage (thus, on tourist routes) emerged as activated and of interest, in particular to public entities. Building on these findings, we went further and - focusing on the LEADER areas - collected evidence in interaction with public and private stakeholders. Using semi-structured interviews and focus groups, we examined critical issues associated with the implementation of the Policy to grasp the degree of incisiveness of the measures which place the tourist route at the centre of a rural development discourse.
Mots clés : tourism development|tourist route|rural development|EU-RDP|North-East Italy
A104241LR