Tourism destination benchmarking analysis of the Tara and Kopaonik national parks

Abstract

The most visited national parks of Serbia are Kopaonik and Tara. The aim of the paper is to compare these two national parks as tourist destinations and to highlight the importance of tourism planning in national parks. Data on the current state of tourism in the Tara National Park and Kopaonik National Park were collected through a review of relevant literature and websites, and analyzed in terms of comparison, i.e. using benchmarking and statistical methods. The benchmarking analysis was carried out for these two most visited national parks of Serbia, but it should be emphasized that the motives for visiting these destinations are not only their natural values. Kopaonik is the most visited mountain in Serbia after Zlatibor and an attractive winter resort not only on the domestic but also on the international tourism market. The tourist capacities of Kopaonik are greater and better in terms of quality than those located on the mountain of Tara and tourist traffic is greater on Kopaonik than on the Tara mountain.

Keywords

• National park
• Tara
• Koponik
• tourist traffic
• benchmarking