Identifying Cultural Tourism Potentials in Republic of Moldova through Cultural Consumption among Tourists

Abstract

In last decades, tourism development in Moldova has improved in terms of tourist flows, both as a diversification of tourism demand and tourism products. These improvements give grounds for an optimistic prognosis for the tourist industry in Moldova. Regarding this, authors revisits the phenomenon of cultural tourism in the country, in order to identify cultural tourism potential through cultural consumption among tourists, applying a special tourism survey. At the same time, there are a number of factors which may endanger sustainable development of tourism in Moldova, this is due primary by a imperfect cultural management that risks to endanger cultural heritage from the country. Another critical limitation on the development of cultural tourism is the low involvement of the population in cultural and tourist events held in the country. The study concludes that current situation calls for a more flexible and innovative approach to tourism industry development in the country.