The Role of Cultural Resources in Sustainable Tourism Management: Evidence from Emerging Tourist Destinations

Abstract

Cultural resources are very important as far as the identity of the destination is concerned and in the growth of a sustainable tourism especially in the developing tourist destinations where heritage resources form a major competitive edge. Nevertheless, there is scanty empirical evidence on how cultural resources can be useful in managing sustainable tourism and destination competitiveness. The objective of this research paper is to address the structural association of cultural resource, sustainable practises in tourism management, satisfaction of the tourists, and competitiveness of the destination. Quantitative research design was utilised in the form of structured survey that was conducted on the tourists visiting the selected emerging destinations and 412 valid responses were received. The proposed hypotheses were tested on the basis of the Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) analysis and the bootstrapping procedures of the proposed hypothesis analysis. According to the results, cultural resources play a significant role in the management of sustainable tourism (β = 0.64, p < 0.001) and destination image (β = 0.51, p < 0.001). There are also positive impacts of sustainable tourism management on tourist satisfaction (β = 0.47, p < 0.01)and destination competitiveness (β = 0.43, p < 0.01). The predicted model has significant explanatory power, and the R 2 of sustainable tourism management and destination competitiveness are 0.58 and 0.62 respectively. The results justify the Resource-Based View since they verify cultural resources as strategic amenities that precipitate sustainable and competitive development of the destination. This paper has added to the theoretical body of knowledge by incorporating the cultural resource management into the models of sustainable tourism and provided practical implications to the destination managers and policymakers who want to create long-term competitiveness based on the policies that are culturally based in terms of sustainability.