Temporal and spatial aspects of tourism in Turkey.

Abstract

Tourism supply and demand varies from one region to another and from one season to another in many destination countries. These variations provide certain benefits as well as problems and disadvantages. The developing countries need balanced development more than others as they need scarce resources of tourism, such as the natural environment, today as well as in the future, to be able to sustain the economy and the nation. The first chapter explains the need for this study, its aims and objectives together with detailed information about general outlook of Turkey and tourism development. As a developing country, despite its short history of mass tourism movements, Turkey has experienced massive growth in tourism and the effects of variations in time and place since the 1980s.Spatial and temporal variations in Turkish tourism have increased and tourism movements are concentrated increasingly in the coastal regions of the Mediterranean and Aegean and in the peak season between May and October since the late 1980s,while other regions and off-season are neglected. This reflects partly the basic structure of tourism demand towards Turkey and most importantly a lack of a national tourism policy and the failure of present policy and strategies to combat the potentially damaging effects of tourism on social and environmental resources and increase and spread the benefits of tourism as much as possible The second chapter tries to put temporal and spatial imbalance in general and in Turkey into perspective. Turkey has great unspoiled natural,cultural and historical resources and potential which will allow Turkey to develop supply-led tourism products as well as demand-led products and to combine both products in order to create market-led products, improving the uneven temporal and spatial distribution of tourism. After describing the methodology in the third chapter, the fourth chapter identifies the demographic and motivational characteristics and the reasons behind their seasonal and spatial preferences which indicate that each shoulder and each destination has its own segment. Regional tourism development policies, strategies and plans with goals to reduce both spatially and seasonally uneven distribution of tourism should be introduced. The tourism industry indicates great importance for Turkey and specifically for less-developed tourism regions of Turkey due to its unique advantages. The fifth chapter discusses the effects of temporal and spatial disparity in Turkey, explores the development and marketing options available for developing tourism destinations to follow, such as, encouraging tourism in certain regions by giving incentives, completing infra- and super-structure and promoting and marketing currently available and potential tourism products in those regions or encouraging tourism in all regions regardless of the type and location of products. It is obvious that there is a relationship between temporal and spatial imbalance. Therefore, understanding these relationships can and will help to achieve better balanced tourism development and management in Turkey, as well as other developing destinations.The development of Turkish tourism is still at its early stage and appropriate actions against present and future problems can prevent or avoid tomorrow's difficulties. This study aims to identify and diagnose spatial and temporal problems and the relationships between these two problems and contribute to the tourism industry by developing effective development and marketing strategies.