Romanian Rural World Heritage Sites and Tourism Development

Objective: The aim of this article is to investigate if Romanian rural localities hosting or situated within a natural WHS (World Heritage Site) have benefited from their situation and developed the local rural tourism.

Research Design & Methods: Since the topic of this article had not been previously investigated for Romania, the research was constructed as a case study, exploring the available secondary data on tourism supply and demand. Within the case study, a combination of empirical methods was used in order to investigate two ratios (the survival rate and continuity ratio) constructed to study the sustainability of the offer of local tourism.

Findings: Romanian rural localities hosting or being part of a WHS do not exploit properly their tourist potential. However, these localities are in a better position than common rural localities from the viewpoint of a sustainable tourism offer.

Implications & Recommendations: Further studies on tourism demand and tourism governance for WHS localities are needed in order to help local governments to develop authentic and sustainable tourism for these areas.

Contribution & Value Added: Given the sparse academic Romanian literature focusing on WHSs, this study contributes to this field and opens new avenues for research. Furthermore, the findings of this study add to the existing international literature by supporting the idea that simply the presence of a WHS in rural areas is not a panacea for promoting tourism.