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Question: Rural Tourism Definition
Answer: Rural tourism may be defined as the movement of people from their normal place of residence to rural areas for a minimum period of twenty-four hours to the maximum of six months for the sole purpose of leisure and pleasure. Rural tourism refers to all tourism activities in a rural area.
The concept of rural tourism is by no means well defined and is subject to a number of interpretation. Fleischer and Pizam associate rural tourism with the ‘country vacation’ where the tourist spends the vast proportion of his/her vacation period engaging in recreational activities in a rural environment on a farm, ranch, country home, or the surrounding areas.
OECD defines the rural area as, ” at the local level, a population density of 150 persons per square kilometer is the preferred criterion. At the regional level, geographic units are grouped by the share of their population that is rural into the following three types: predominantly rural (50%), significantly rural (15-50%) and predominantly urbanized regions (15%).
The Council of Europe employed the term ‘rural area‘ to denote the following characteristics:
A stretch of inland or coastal countryside, including small towns and villages, where the main part of the area is used for:
- Agriculture, forestry, aquaculture, and fisheries.
- Economic and cultural activities of country-dwellers.
- Non-urban recreation and leisure areas or nature reserves.
- Other purposes such as housing.
According to Dernoi, rural tourism might be conceived as tourism activities in a ‘non-urban territory where human (land-related economic) activity is going on, primarily agriculture: a permanent human presence seems a qualifying requirement’.
The OECD states rural tourism should be:
- Located in rural areas.
- Functionally rural, built upon the rural world’s special features; small-scale enterprises, open space, contact with nature and the natural world, heritage, traditional societies, and traditional practices.
- Rural in scale – both in terms of building and settlements – and therefore, small scale.
- Traditional in character, growing slowly and organically, and connected with local families.
- Sustainable – in the sense that its development should help sustain the special rural character of an area, and in the sense that its development should be sustainability in its use of resources.
- Of many different kinds, representing the complex pattern of the rural environment, economy, and history.
(Source: Tourism Notes - Educational Portal , 11 Oct 2021)
Source Link: https://tourismnotes.com/rural-tourism/