Impact of active tourism on economic development: Example of the Fruška Gora National park (Vojvodina, north Serbia)

Abstract

Over the past few years, there has been intensified research about active tourism development in the area of Fruška Gora National Park and its impact on economic and business development, namely, potential development of certain economic categories within the given area and the gravitating area of the national park. Based on this, the main hypothesis has been formulated. It explains that more intensive development of tourism trends (for which favourable preconditions exist) in Fruška Gora National Park have positive impact on the overall economic development of the gravitation zone, which includes the area of the city of Novi Sad (Serbia). The primary goal of this study was to investigate the attitudes of respondents about Fruška Gora National Park as a tourism resource suitable for development of active tourism, and to show existing and potential impacts of the economic categories. The survey was conducted in prominent cycling, hiking and equestrian clubs in the city of Novi Sad, and on a random sample of the residents of Novi Sad (the sample of 303 respondents). The data were processed with the SPSS program (version 17.0). To determine the frequency of specific deviations chi square test was used.

Keywords

• active tourism
• economic development
• Fruška Gora National park
• Vojvodina
• Serbia