Tourism Industry and Government Policy: Italy
Introduction
Tourism is an activity that cuts across the conventional sectors in the economy. It requires inputs of an economic, social, cultural as well as environmental nature, thus often described as being multi-faceted (Lickorish & Jenkins, 1997, p. 1).
Tourism is considered as one of the most important and vital industry in Italy. It was ranked as the most popular tourist destination during 1998, with a total of 58,499,000 visitors from abroad that arrived in the said country. In 2000, the revenues from the tourists industry had reached to .5 billion with an amazing number of 62,702,228 arrivals of visitors. During the said year, there were about 1,854,100 hotel beds that are available in hotels and other accommodation (Encyclopedia of the Nations 2007).
History and Development of the Tourism Industry of Italy
The word feria (plural feriae) first appeared in the ancient Rome, it a Latin word that means Festival and it took on the meaning of vacation. The Latin festival had become the first model of the mobile holiday, far from one’s place or residence (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
In 17th century the term Grand Tour was used to define the relationship of education and travel by Sir Francis Bacon. Italy was considered as the most popular destination. By 1913, tourism had become an opportunity, and there were about 90,000 British visitors, this is because of natural and historical characteristics of the country (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
The economic and political uncertainty between the two world wars was the primary reason of the first intervention of the national government of Italy to get involved in the tourism industry, particular after the devastating impact of the Great Depression during 1929 (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
The Italian State Tourist Office was created in 1919, and was given a mandate to gather different data and information in order to make a legislative proposal that will help to promote the country’s domestic tourism, thus focusing on the international tourism, as well as to facilitate different bank credit for the hotels. In 1932, the national government set up the Provincial Committees for Tourism that later on became the Provincial Offices. It acts as the local branches of the government in the sector. In 1924, bank credit facilitation for hotels was enacted and was followed by different programs and activities regarding the process of measuring in order to promote the domestic and international demand (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
The government also focuses on the domestic demand by Fascist Saturday, yearly paid vacations, snow trains as well as the blue trains that can help to increase the local demand for tourism. In addition to that, the government also focuses on the needs of the foreign tourists like the discounted gasoline coupons as well as implementation of advantageous foreign exchange rate for the foreigners or known as the tourist lire (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
Due to the said effort of the government, the country had become the country with the most substantial accommodation structure in all of Europe. During 1994, there were already 34,549 hotels and other similar establishments with a total of 944,227 rooms and 1,724,333 beds. There are 2,346 collective tourism establishments with the total of 1,223,671 (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
The country had completed its postwar economic reconstruction during 1958 that helps to restructure the country from an agriculture-based to an industry-centered economy. It had helped to maintain the stability of the tourism industry. During the said year, the international tourism industry of the country increased to .7 billion. The said number increase in 1995, and reach .4 billion (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
During 1995, the expenditure of the Italian tourists who are going abroad had reached up to .4 billion, that shows that the tourism is considered as the main export of services and considered as the second largest export items compare to other goods, that gained a total of 11.1% of exports during 1985, and increased to 11.9% in 1995 (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
The result of the extensive management of the government regarding the tourism industry of the country had result to the growth of the interests of different hotel chains in the country. Furthermore the country had gained a pre-eminent position in the international tourism market and was ranked as top 4 country destinations from 1980 to 1996. The annual average growth rate in the said year was 2.5%; the share of arrivals worldwide had reached 7.7% during 1980 and touched 5.5% during 1996. the said development help the country to move from third to second rank for the tourism receipts among the global top tourism earners, having an outstanding growth rate of 8.4% (Jafari, 2000, p. 333).
During 2001, the tourism industry of the country faced different challenges primarily because of the September 11 attacks on the US. Tour operator reports that there are about 70% slumps (The New York Times, 2001).
Tourism Policy in Italy
Foreign Currency Transaction
Since 2002, all of the monetary transactions in Italy as well as other countries in Europe are in the European currency, which is euro. Euro is considered as very stable and powerful, that it had become of the best currencies in the world and it is also used in most of the transactions. This policy helps to encourages tourism to increase because of the unified currency with the twelve different countries (Saltagi & Saltagi, 2004). The introduction of the Euro as well as the implementation of the single European monetary policy is one of the greatest challenges, not only in the history of Italy, but also in the entire history of Europe. According to Leu (1998) it will not only serve as a means of payment, but also serve as an instrument of the identity of Europe, that will help to position the Destination Europe in global tourism (as cited from Rátz & Puczkó, 1999).
The influence of the introduction of the Euro focuses on the simplicity of the entire financial transaction that will help to increase the transparency in the tourist industry and market of the country, as well as the entire Europe. This will result to overall improvement of the price-value ratio of goods as well as services, together with the increased in the competition that will benefits both the tourists as well as the entire tourism industry of the country and the different players in the said industry (Rátz & Puczkó, 1999).
Environment Protection
Italy is considered as a very rich country, not only in terms of financial aspect but also regarding the art and nature. The said two aspects are considered as primary factors that can affect the image of the country towards the possible visitors or tourists. And because tourism is considered as one of the primary resources for the country, there are different laws and policies that had been implemented for past 20 years for the protection of the nature, thus helping to decrease the amount of pollution in the cities (Saltagi & Saltagi, 2004).
The priority environmental issues focuses on the urban air pollution, soil and water management, waste management, nature and landscape conservation, climate change, transport management as well as the protection of the coastal areas and the marine environment (OECD, n.d.).
In order to come up with the changing environmental aspect that can affect the tourism industry of the country, the country strengthened its national environmental institutions, issued new environmental legislation as well as further developed environmental responsibilities to different regional and local authorities (Saltagi & Saltagi, 2004).
Cultural Policy
Culture plays a very important role in the tourism industry of any country. This is due to the fact that it is incorporated in the hospitality activities and programs of a given country. The said policy focuses on the streamlining the myriad of subsequent laws that regulates the different cultural domains heritage, cinema, performing arts, etc that can be done by process of adopting more comprehensive laws that will deal with all the multifaceted aspects of the various discipline (Compendium, n.d.).
The government of the country is implementing different programs and activities that will help the country to boost their culture and then use it as an attraction in order to improve the tourism industry of the country. With connection to the said aspect of the county, the implementation of the policy is coordinated with the different strategies within other sectors and industry such as the tourism industry by the cultural tourism itineraries, cultural consumption survey and other common strategies. Furthermore the government is also giving importance on the growing influence of media for the tourism marketing as well as the impact of the image of the country in the global tourism market. That is the reason why the government is introducing more pluralism in the extremely concentrated media system of the country on the agenda of the government. This is supported by the legislation regarding the television and audiovisual sector (Compendium, n.d.). This is important because of the growing negative image and feedback of the visitors and tourists towards the hotel industry of the country (Italy 2008).
Italian Hotel Classification
Due to the different problems and challenges that are currently faced by the tourism industry of the country, the National Tourism Industry of the country had decided to implement the policy Italian Hotel Classification. It will help to improve the chaotic and confusing star ratings standard of the country regarding the hotel industry (Italy 2008).
This is an answer of the country to the ever changing behavior of the tourists, primarily those business travelers who are meticulous as well as dependent to different high tech or updated gadgets.
Problems and Possible Solution in Tourism Industry of Italy
As of now, the tourism industry of the country is facing different challenges and difficulties. According to the National Union of Chambers of Commerce Italy is increasingly and continuously losing its market share in the international tourism industry (Italy 2008). The country shows a great fall in the tourism industry from 1980 with 9% to 5% of the entire market.
The main problem of the country focuses on their hotel industry that is facing different issues and bad feedback from the visitors. That is why it is important for the country to implement different programs and policy that will help the entire hotel industry to regain its image and reputation, thus improve their connection to the tourists.
The said aspect can be done and implement by the government by connecting the tourism department and authority of the country to the different important sector as well as player inside the industry of tourism. It will be important to maintain high standard and quality regarding the accommodation of the tourists and visitors which mainly focus on the hotel industry as well as the recreation like amusement park and shopping malls.
It shows that the primary problem of the country is their lack of innovation and development in terms of their service and infrastructure. It is important to consider the technology is one of the primary factors that helped different successful and upcoming tourism industry in the world, primarily Hong Kong and Dubai.
It will be important for the country to focus on different infrastructure of the country such as transportation and other related aspects in order to gain popularity and exposure, not only to the possible visitors, but also to the possible investors that will invest huge capitals for high quality hotels, shopping malls and even amusement park that will add up to the features of the entire tourism industry of the country.
Above all, it is also important for the government to improve their standard for quality, thus improve the connectivity and relationship of different sectors and players inside the tourism industry of the country in order to make sure that their services and offerings will come up with the ever-changing and challenging demands and desire of the tourists, that will help to satisfy them and gain more internal market.
Above all, it is important for the country to improve their environmental policy in order to help the citizens of the country to be aware of the current environmental issues and problems that can affect the entire performance of the country in the global market.
References
Environmental Performance Review of Italy, OECD, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/17/7/2709780.pdf
Italian Tourism Industry In ‘Freefall’ 2008, Italy, Poundbury Publishing, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.italymag.co.uk/italy/travel/italian-tourism-industry-freefall
Italy/ 4: Current Issues in Cultural Policy Development and Debate, Compendium, Cultural Policies and Trends in Europe, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.culturalpolicies.net/web/italy.php?aid=41
Italy in Figures 2006 (2006). Istat, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.istat.it/dati/catalogo/20050912_01/testointegrale.pdf
Italy: Tourism, Travel and Recreation (2007). Encyclopedia of the Nations, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.nationsencyclopedia. com/Europe/Italy-TOURISM-TRAVEL-AND-RECREATION.html
Jafari, J (Ed.) (2000). Encyclopedia of Tourism, London: Routledge
Rátz, T. & Puczkó, L. (1999). The Future of Tourism in the European Monetary Union, Budapest University of Economic Sciences, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.ratztamara.com/euro.html
Saltagi, R. & Saltagi, S. (2004). Italy: Economic Policy Analysis, The McKeever Institute of Economic Policy Analysis, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.mkeever.com/italy.html
Tourism Industry Seeks Aid in Italy 2001, The New York Times, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res =9C00E6D71F30F930A35752C1A9679C8B63
Travel and Tourism in Italy 2007, Euromonitor, Retrieved October 2, 2008, from http://www.euromonitor.com/Travel_And_Tourism_in_Italy
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