The Effect of Cultural and Natural Heritage on Tourism Attractiveness in Slovakia

• Název práce v češtině: Vliv kulturního a přírodního dědictví na turismus na Slovensku
• Název v anglickém jazyce: The Effect of Cultural and Natural Heritage on Tourism Attractiveness in Slovakia
• Klíčová slova: turismus, kulturní dědictví, přírodní dědictví, atraktivita, regionální analýza
• Klíčová slova anglicky: tourism, cultural heritage, natural heritage, attractiveness, regional analysis
• Akademický rok vypsání: 2019/2020
• Typ práce: bakalářská práce
• Jazyk práce: angličtina
• Ústav: Institut ekonomických studií (23-IES)
• Vedoucí / školitel: PhDr. Lenka Šťastná, Ph.D.
• Řešitel: skrytý - zadáno vedoucím/školitelem
• Datum přihlášení: 15.07.2020
• Datum zadání: 20.07.2020
• Datum a čas obhajoby: 08.09.2022 09:00
• Místo konání obhajoby: Opletalova - Opletalova 26, O314, Opletalova - místn. č. 314
• Datum odevzdání elektronické podoby: 02.08.2022
• Datum proběhlé obhajoby: 08.09.2022
• Oponenti: Mgr. Klára Kantová

Seznam odborné literatury

Assaf, A. G. & Josiassen, A. (2012). Identifying and Ranking the Determinants of Tourism Performance: A Global Investigation. In: Journal of Travel Research (Vol. 51 (4), pp. 388–399). DOI: 10.1177/0047287511426337

Bowitz, E. & Ibenholt, K. (2009). Economic impacts of cultural heritage – Research and perspectives. In: Journal of Cultural Heritage (Vol. 10 (1), pp. 1-8). DOI: 10.1016/j.culher.2008.09.002

Cerisola, S. (2019). A new perspective on the cultural heritage–development nexus: the role of creativity. In: Journal of Cultural Economics (Vol. 43 (1), pp. 21–56). DOI: 10.1007/s10824-018-9328-2

Council of the European Union (2014). Conclusions on cultural heritage as a strategic resource for a sustainable Europe. Education, youth, culture and sport Council meeting [online]. [cit. 2020-5-10]. https://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/educ/142705.pdf

Cuccia, T., Guccio, C. & Rizzo, I. (2016). The effects of UNESCO World Heritage List inscription on tourism destinations performance in Italian regions. In: Economic Modelling (Vol. 53, pp. 494-508). DOI: 10.1016/j.econmod.2015.10.049

European Commission, Directorate General for Research and Innovation (2015). Getting Cultural Heritage to Work for Europe: Report of the Horizon 2020 Expert Group on Cultural Heritage. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union. ISBN 978-92-79-46046-3.

European Commission (2019). Natural and Cultural Heritage in Europe: Working together within the Natura 2000 network. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union. ISBN 978-92-76-08752-6.

Farid, S. M. (2015). Tourism Management in World Heritage Sites and its Impact on Economic Development in Mali and Ethiopia. In: Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences (Vol. 211, pp. 595-604). DOI: 10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.11.078

International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (2014). The Benefits of Natural World Heritage: Identifying and assessing ecosystem services and benefits provided by the world’s most iconic natural places (p. 58). Gland, Switzerland: IUCN. ISBN 978-2-8317-1694-7

Luo, W. (2018). Evaluating Tourist Destination Performance: Expanding the Sustainability Concept. In: Sustainability (Vol. 10 (2), 516). DOI: 10.3390/su10020516

Pasikowska-Schnass, M. (2018). Cultural heritage in EU policies [online]. European Parliamentary Research Service, [cit. 2020-05-10]. https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2018/621876/EPRS_BRI%282018%29621876_EN.pdf

Throsby, D. (2012). Investment in Urban Heritage: Economic Impacts of Cultural Heritage Projects in FYR Macedonia and Georgia [online]. World Bank [cit. 2020-5-10]. http://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/779821468054243731/pdf/NonAsciiFileName0.pdf

Towse, R & Hernández, T. N. (2020). Handbook of Cultural Economics (3rd ed.). UK and USA: Edward Elgar Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78897-579-7

UNESCO (2011). The Social benefits of heritage [online]. In: Museum International (Vol. 63 (1-2)) [cit. 2020-05-10]. ISSN 1350-0775. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000216604

UNESCO. Sustainable Development: World Heritage and Sustainable Development [online]. [cit. 2020-05-10]. https://whc.unesco.org/en/sustainabledevelopment/

Předběžná náplň práce v anglickém jazyce

Research question and motivation

European institutions and UNESCO regularly highlight the importance and positive impacts of cultural and natural heritage in their reports and articles (UNESCO 2011, European Parliamentary Research Service 2018, European Commission 2019 etc.). In May 2014 the Council of the EU identified cultural heritage as “a strategic resource for a sustainable Europe” and year 2018 was declared as European Year of Cultural Heritage. This kind of heritage gives the society many often non-measurable economic benefits and externalities, such as enhanced quality of life, building identity and increasing social cohesion (European Commission 2015). Cerisola (2019) went in her economic study even further and argued that the cultural heritage could inspire people to the higher artistic and scientific creativity, which could than have an indirect positive effect on the economic development. Moreover, the natural heritage also undeniably belongs to the concept of sustainable development in the EU. The preservation of natural heritage sites is guaranteed by the strong legislation and many projects were carried out to fight against the loss of biodiversity in Europe, such as European network of protected sites Natura 2000 (European Commission 2019). The benefits of natural sites preservation, and especially of the Natural World Heritage, are discussed, for example, in the report written by the IUCN in 2014. According to this paper, the World Heritage sites help to alleviate effects of climate change, the protection of the ecosystem has many direct and indirect benefits on local communities and the benefits are often “associated with providing health and recreation values, knowledge, contributing to the local economy, and cultural and spiritual values.” Tourism belongs to the most apparent and direct benefits brought by cultural and natural heritage. This industry, especially in some parts of Europe, is one of the crucial economic areas that employs a large number of people.

All these arguments could lead to the assumption that locations with the higher share and importance of cultural and natural heritage sites have an advantage in attracting tourists and their local development, compared to the regions, where their representation is poorer. It might be important to note that the aforementioned benefits of cultural and natural heritage, even it might not look like they have a link to tourism, have some effect on the development of local communities, which can influence the tourism attractiveness indirectly. Assaf and Josiassen (2012) examined in their study the determinants of tourism performance at the international level and the most significant determinants included also factors like economic conditions, security, safety, and health and environmental sustainability. It can be assumed that similar effects can also be seen locally.

Tourist destinations are often extraordinary and unique. The areas inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List, which is a guarantee of a significant importance and quality, play a special role in this case. The idea that cultural and natural heritage sites, and especially those with the world’s importance, can trigger the local development, has been frequently discussed in the last years. As a part of 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, UNESCO emphasizes the role of the World Heritage and its potential in many areas, such as attracting investments and “ensuring green, locally-based, stable and decent jobs, only some of which may be related to tourism” (UNESCO official website). According to a study by Farid (2015), which examines the case of two African states, there exists a positive correlation between the existence of the World Heritage sites and the number of tourists. Another paper written by Cuccia and Guccio (2016) studies the case of UNESCO World Heritage in Italy and the effect of the World List inscription on the tourist performance. Although the results show that cultural and environmental heritage has a positive effect on this performance, the impact of UNESCO inscribed site is negative. Another literature, which deals with similar problems are, for example, works by Bowitz and Ibenholt (2009) or by Throsby (2012).

In this thesis, I would like to focus on the case of locations in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, since both countries are relatively easily comparable, thanks to the common history they shared in the past and both are relatively rich in the amount of cultural and natural heritage sites. The first question I would like to state, is, whether the presence of cultural and natural heritage in the areas of the Czech Republic and Slovakia has some significant positive effect on particular indices of tourist performance and whether the locations inscribed in the World Heritage List are more attractive for tourists, compared to other regions. Since tourist destinations differ a lot between each other, also economically, socially etc., another question, which arises is, what factors influence the tourist attractiveness of the locations most significantly.

Contribution

As mentioned above, many studies indicate how the presence of cultural and natural heritage could positively influence the local development. Important cultural and natural heritage sites are located across the whole area of both countries. Some of these locations became famous tourist destinations, but the others, although they are often also very historically, culturally or naturally valuable, are not very well known even by the local population, and monuments there often get dilapidated and ruined, and nature is being destroyed. In this thesis, I will try to find out which factors have the most significant effects on the tourist performance of these locations. This could help to explain, why unlike other regions, some are thriving and what could be done to stimulate the tourist performance of the underdeveloped potential tourist destinations.

Methodology

I will use the open-source data mainly from the Czech and Slovak Statistical Offices and the internet sites of particular ministries. The focus will be on the municipalities with extended powers in the Czech Republic (ORP) and districts in Slovakia (okres). These administrative divisions seem to be relatively comparable, since districts in the Czech Republic are in average more populated than those in Slovakia. Only the years following 2005 were chosen as the examination period, because the data before this time are often not published online. To find out how the particular factors influence the tourist performance a regression analysis will be conducted.

Values, such as the number of nights spent at tourist accommodation establishments or average duration of stay can be used as a dependent variable describing the tourist performance. Similar variables to measure tourist destination performance have also been used by Cuccia and Guccio (2016) and Luo (2018). The number and importance of cultural heritage sites in certain regions is one of the main independent variables, which influences the tourist performance we are interested in. The information about monuments in examined locations could be found in the register at the websites of the National Heritage Institute of the Czech Republic and The Monuments Board of the Slovak Republic. It could be used as a sign of quality, if the monuments are of the national importance or even are inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List, which would be measured as a dummy variable. An important factor, which could have an influence on the attractiveness of a location, is how interesting the adjacent area is, e.g. if there are any remarkable sites nearby. Therefore, it would also make sense to analyze some spatial synergic effect of these locations. Another important variable could be a number of cultural institutions and events in the area announced at the websites of statistical offices and ministries of culture.

However, not only cultural, but also natural heritage is important for the tourist potential of a certain destination. It could be estimated as the influence of the number of hectares of national parks and other natural reservations, which are located nearby. In addition, the amount of tourism depends also on other attractions in the region, such as ski resorts or lakes and spas. Other variables would include infrastructure and accessibility, measured as a distance from the nearest important airport and access to highways and important railways and a crime rate. The relevant data are again published at the websites of the statistical offices. If required, other important variables could also be added in the course of the research.

Outline

Abstract
1. Introduction
2. Theoretical Framework
3. Literature review
4. Methodology
5. Summary of results
6. Conclusion
7. List of academic literature