Tourism planning and development: The case of Portugal’s Norte region
Tourism has been gaining increasing importance in the global economy, in general, and, more specifically, in Europe, Portugal, and smaller areas such as Portugal’s Norte region. The north of Portugal has a rich cultural, historical and architectural landscape heritage, including some pearls that...
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| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
University of Algarve, ESGHT/CINTURS
2017-10-01
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| Series: | Tourism & Management Studies |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://tmstudies.net/index.php/ectms/article/view/968/pdf_67 |
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| Summary: | Tourism has been gaining increasing importance in the global economy,
in general, and, more specifically, in Europe, Portugal, and smaller areas
such as Portugal’s Norte region. The north of Portugal has a rich cultural,
historical and architectural landscape heritage, including some pearls
that the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation
has classified over the years as World Heritage Sites. With its wideranging impact on economic growth, employment and social
development, tourism can be a powerful tool with which to shape the
Portuguese economy, contributing to the country’s competitiveness,
richness and cohesion. Therefore, the government and tourism
stakeholders have recently made a stronger commitment to developing
this sector. The goal of this study was to analyse tourism policies’
contributions to the development of the tourism sector in the
northernmost region of Portugal, included in the National Strategic Plan
for Tourism (PENT) and in the Regional North Tourism Agenda (ART). This
study sought to achieve these objectives by focusing on two main
aspects. First, it examined the characteristics of the sector, identifying
the tourism products in the Norte region. Second, this research analysed
the overall picture of the sector’s development between 2004 and 2014.
For that, we made a descriptive analysis of the main tourism indicators
based on data collected from several sources, namely the Instituto
Nacional de Estatística (National Statistics Institute) (INE), PENT, the
Comissão de Coordenação e Desenvolvimento Regional do Norte
(Northern Portugal Regional Coordination and Development
Commission), Turismo de Portugal (Tourism of Portugal) and Turismo do
Porto e Norte de Portugal (Tourism of Oporto and Northern Portugal).
The results reveal that investment in tourism in the Norte region has
included offering eight primary tourism products and differentiators in
four tourism subregions (i.e. Oporto Metropolitan Area, Alto Minho,
Douro and Terras de Trás-os-Montes). Comparing the forecast values in
terms of overnight stays, tourists and revenue set by PENT, the reality
showed that the results were a little bit far from the expected; however,
the findings confirm the common perception that Portugal’s Norte
region is still experiencing a trend towards growth as a tourist
destination. |
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| ISSN: | 2182-8466 |