Developing Sustainable Tourism: An Innovative Approach for Elazığ

Sustainable tourism is an approach that protects natural and societal sources as well as cultural inheritance in the long term and conveys these entities to the next generation so that it improves the life quality of the host region and provides experiences of high quality to the tourists. The aim of sustainable tourism is mainly focused on protecting nature, society, social life, and economic contribution. Elazığ is one of the cities that is placed in the East Anatolian Region of Turkey and temperate climate and is a good candidate for exercising sustainable tourism. Elazığ does not only have an ancient history that was depicted in many fables and ballads or has a beautiful nature but also has looms that hosted different civilizations throughout history, the proof of which reveals itself in its local culture as well as cuisine that was inherited from those civilizations. This study aimed to find out the current condition of sustainable tourism in Elazığ and how to improve it depending on the results coming from the survey that was applied to people who reside in Elazığ. 520 people in total participated in the survey and participants were categorized as Elazig local people, academicians, tradesmen, tourism sector. Survey results were analyzed by SPSS 22.0 software. The study reveals that there are points to be improved in the coordination and interaction of tourism‐related organizations with one another, that Elazigʹs unique and attractive attributes should be prioritized, and that necessary investments should be made to improve sustainable tourism in Elazığ.