Considering regional challenges when prioritizing tourism policy interventions: evidence from a Mediterranean community of projects

Abstract

Policy-led interventions in the tourism domain should acknowledge the particular challenges of the territories to be implemented to promote desirable impacts. When intervention areas exceed the national level, the indicator approach may prove effective in determining the particular needs of different areas, thus better identifying projects that could bring the most change to lagging areas. The present study tests the potential of indicators to drive spatially targeted policies by proposing and implementing a methodological framework that examines whether the activities of selected projects under the 1st call of the Interreg-MED Thematic Objective of Sustainable Tourism effectively covered the needs of the Mediterranean regions. Furthermore, it builds regional clusters as a means to prioritize future interventions in the most suitable regions, in consideration of their particular weaknesses. The analysis revealed that interventions could have been more effectively allocated, and that more active participation of Mediterranean regions is needed. The proposed framework could serve as a starting point for enhancing the evaluation processes for project selection and lead to improvements in the policy framework for sustainable tourism.