A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
Heritage preservation: is it a motivation for agritourism entrepreneurship?
Objectives. Previous studies on agritourism entrepreneurship have identified a variety of economic and non-economic motivations driving farm operators to start the agritourism activity. Nonetheless, local heritage preservation and enhancement have been completely overlooked. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether “heritage preservation and enhancement” (in its three facets related to: tangible rural heritage; agrifood heritage; rural way of life heritage) is a specific non-economic motivation for agritourism entrepreneurship.Methodology. A survey on a sample of 226 Italian agritourism operators was conducted in March 2015. Data were first analysed through a Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and then through the importance-performance analysis (IPA).Findings. The results show that there are 5 different groups of motivations to start the agritourism business, namely: i) economic motivations; ii) personal and family-related motivations; iii) tangible rural heritage preservation and enhancement; iv) agrifood heritage preservation and enhancement; v) rural way of life heritage preservation and enhancement. Hence “heritage preservation and enhancement” (in its three facets) has a pivotal role and it is more important than economic motivations. Similarly operators are more satisfied for having contributed to heritage preservation than for having obtained economic benefits from the agritourism activity.Research limits. Caution should be paid before extending these results to countries other than Italy (where, for example, agrifood heritage has a strong and peculiar tradition and connection with the territory).Practical implications. Operators are well aware of their contribution to the preservation and enhancement of local heritage but also perceive that tourists are not always able to appreciate the value of this contribution and have misconceptions about the essence of agritourism. This may be the result also of the use of the label “agritourism” to indicate offerings (such as agri-spas or basic ...
Heritage preservation: is it a motivation for agritourism entrepreneurship?
Objectives. Previous studies on agritourism entrepreneurship have identified a variety of economic and non-economic motivations driving farm operators to start the agritourism activity. Nonetheless, local heritage preservation and enhancement have been completely overlooked. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether “heritage preservation and enhancement” (in its three facets related to: tangible rural heritage; agrifood heritage; rural way of life heritage) is a specific non-economic motivation for agritourism entrepreneurship.Methodology. A survey on a sample of 226 Italian agritourism operators was conducted in March 2015. Data were first analysed through a Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and then through the importance-performance analysis (IPA).Findings. The results show that there are 5 different groups of motivations to start the agritourism business, namely: i) economic motivations; ii) personal and family-related motivations; iii) tangible rural heritage preservation and enhancement; iv) agrifood heritage preservation and enhancement; v) rural way of life heritage preservation and enhancement. Hence “heritage preservation and enhancement” (in its three facets) has a pivotal role and it is more important than economic motivations. Similarly operators are more satisfied for having contributed to heritage preservation than for having obtained economic benefits from the agritourism activity.Research limits. Caution should be paid before extending these results to countries other than Italy (where, for example, agrifood heritage has a strong and peculiar tradition and connection with the territory).Practical implications. Operators are well aware of their contribution to the preservation and enhancement of local heritage but also perceive that tourists are not always able to appreciate the value of this contribution and have misconceptions about the essence of agritourism. This may be the result also of the use of the label “agritourism” to indicate offerings (such as agri-spas or basic ...
Heritage preservation: is it a motivation for agritourism entrepreneurship?
CASSIA, FABIO (author) / Bruni, Attilio (author) / Magno, Francesca (author) / Cassia, Fabio / Bruni, Attilio / Magno, Francesca
2015-01-01
Conference paper
Electronic Resource
English
tourism , heritage , agritourism , farm , rural tourism
DDC:
710