BANAT UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES AND VETERINARY MEDICINE TIMISOARA FACULTY OF FARM MANAGEMENT TRIȘCĂU IOAN DOCTORAL THESIS ABSTRACT

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1 BANAT UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES AND VETERINARY MEDICINE TIMISOARA FACULTY OF FARM MANAGEMENT TRIȘCĂU IOAN DOCTORAL THESIS ABSTRACT THESIS ADVISOR: PROFESSOR, IOAN PETROMAN, Ph.D. TIMIŞOARA 2010

2 BANAT UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES AND VETERINARY MEDICINE TIMISOARA FACULTY OF FARM MANAGEMENT TRIȘCĂU IOAN DOCTORAL THESIS ABSTRACT RESEARCH CONCERNING THE IMPROVEMENT OF MANAGEMENT AND MARKETING OF RURAL AND FARM TOURISM IN TIMIS COUNTY THESIS ADVISOR: PROFESSOR, IOAN PETROMAN, Ph.D. TIMIŞOARA 2010

3 ABSTRACT The doctoral thesis titled RESEARCH CONCERNING THE IMPROVEMENT OF MANAGEMENT AND MARKETING OF RURAL AND FARM TOURISM IN TIMIS COUNTY reflects a period characterised, according to statistics concerning the year 2009, by the following: - an ongoing process of development and modernisation of tourism structures; - a decrease of the number of international travels at Romania s borders, with 15.2% less foreign visitors compared to 2008; - a decrease of overnight stays, with 16.1% less than in 2008; - a decrease of the accommodation holding capacity, with 13.5% less tourists than in Despite the fact that the Romanian Federation of the Patronages in the Tourism Industry has made efforts to diminish the negative effects of the crisis on economic agents in the field through: - improving the normative and institutional framework of activity for tourism economic agents, - supporting economic agents in tourism in their current economic activities, the year 2010 is, from a tourism point of view, similar to the year Analysing the official documents concerning the measures meant to help recover the Romanian tourism, we could see that there is no mention whatsoever, neither in the mini-report for 2009, nor in the strategic plan for 2010, concerning the rural tourism, the agri-tourism, the farm tourism, or any other form of tourism whose main activities are being carried out mainly in the rural area. The reasons for this situation seem to be multiple. The most plausible explanation is that rural tourism, in general, and the forms of tourism derived from it, in particular, are not attractive for the Romanian tourist who, on one hand, has just fled the rural area and is not willing to go back to the countryside except when visiting his/her relatives and who, on the other hand, just because he/she is not a traditional city dweller, prefers to spend his/her holidays in places as much marked by civilisation s benefits as possible. This is why implementing rural tourism and its variants in Romania cannot be done unless the focus is changed from the Romanian adult tourist on the foreign adult tourist who is fed up with resorts that resemble each other more and more and with the negative effects of civilisation on nature and from the Romanian adult tourism on the Romanian student (primary school, secondary school) and up to academic schools for certain categories of students (depending

4 on the major courses attended). In our opinion, the only tourists segment interested in rural tourism are the tourists within parishes organising religious tours. This is the perspective from which we carried out our documentation and from which we developed the present doctoral thesis whose conclusions are presented below: Chapter 1, THE MANAGEMENTUL OF THE TOURISM SYSTEM, shows that the tourism potential of the Timiş County has been much too often ignored or even denied though it has everything tourism needs accommodation facilities, food service facilities, entertainment facilities, means of transportation, etc. The Timiş County has the main elements of a well organized tourism: - tourism agencies; - proper transportation facilities; - accommodation facilities; - food service facilities; - entertainment. Chapter 2, THE MANAGEMENTUL OF TOURISM BUSINESS, shows that the main aspects of this type of management that should be taken into account in improving rural and farm tourism management are: - the management of human resources in tourism, with focus on the professional training of the people employed in rural tourism, bearing in mind that developing new jobs for the natives is one of the goals of this type of activity meant to develop the rural area; - the management of tourism marketing; - the tourism strategies; - the management of tourism finances, with focus on financial responsibility and on financial accounting; - the tourism legislation. In chapter three stated RESEARCH METHODOLOGY stands the purpose of this thesis to solve some issues related to research conducted by the management and marketing of rural tourism and farm programs conducted in the studied area, and developing new models of tourist activities that enhance the effectiveness of these forms of tourism in timis rural areas. The proposed activities are planned: - increasing the number of foreign visitors by promoting tourism for ethnic German families, gastronomy, rectreative and funny as specific hybrid forms of rural and farm tourism;

5 - restoring the timis historic village promoting pastoral traditions and customs; - rediscovery of localities where they kept old houses with a particular vernacular architecture; - folk-specific promotion of rural communities in prayer or kirwei; - greater use of surplus accommodation capacity by promoting "the room on the road" where objects are exhibited in the home decor products. The working hypothesis had as self purpose the valuation at maximum parameters of Timis agrotouristic and heritage through solutions and models development for the enhancement of this rural community treasure and specific tourism products and brands development including cultural tourism tourism, rural farm tourism, recreational funny tourism. Programs developed for tourism products is a feature of local tourism development and marketing programs. To meet tourism demand for authentic, we suggest that small homes and agrotouristic farms to be converted to accommodation type Gite rural or Chambre d'ôte that will allow survival of many old houses in the Cenad- Timisoara, Faget area Analysis stages of rural and farm animals tourism activities have resulted in time through the following steps: - drawing up a plan of analysis - gathering information on literature study, resorting to statistical abstracts and yearbooks, and newsletters of interest from professional organizations and local administrative-territorial bodies - verifying and interpreting the information gathered and comparison with other research specialists of own results - interpretation of results and formulation of conclusions and recommendations regarding on management and marketing of tourism businesses, maximizing tourism business, development of touristic implementation of models tourist activities in timis rural areas, implementation of alternative and educational tourism and agrotourism in Cenad- Timisoara and Faget area. 4th chapter, TOURISM MARKETING, discusses in detail the marketing aspects, without which they can't talk no mather the type of business success. There are treated general aspects of marketing (the 4-7 "P" famous in the literature - the tourism product, tourism product price, where tourism is practiced and promoting tourism - travel and consumer) and tourism consumer problem (travel consumer behavior factors that affect the behavior of tourism -consumer environment, culture - psychological profile, market

6 segmentation and target groups of interest, how do their shopping tourists), how to develop tourism product and tourism brand ( management and growth of existing brands - brand management, brand positioning, brand positioning slogans contact with the brand, brand loyalty, the importance of brands, the organization of development of new tourism products), establishing strategic tour price (profit - maximizing profitability and globalization, growth and profit strategy, pricing strategies - cost plus pricing, the benefits of establishing competitive prices, legal and ethical constraints on pricing, customer value creation), tourism channels marketing (definition and operation of the distribution channel direct and indirect distribution channels distribution channels mixed, distribution strategies, development and sales force management - sales force development, sales by geography, by product or market, sales force management, logistics, costs shipping, distribution channels deficiencies; marketing client relationships - the relationship to the retail level, the end-user relationship, legal and ethical considerations) and marketing promotion (based theories - interference, marketing communications, rational vs. emotional sales, communications revolution, development of marketing communication). 5th chapter, IMPLEMENTATION OF TOURIST ACTIVITY MODELS IN TIMIS RURAL AREA, presents a considerable number of types of tourist activities that can be organized in rural areas from the perspective of this PhD thesis - the education one of rural tourism, rural fun tourism and educational fun tourism. With regard to rural educational tourism, insisting on educational valences of this type of rural tourism, on planning visit or stay in private farms, the management of general activities and the management group of children, and the management of visitor impacts on different areas of private farms. There are identified agro farms in Timis County and the types of activities organized by them in connection with agritourism, the timing of specific training activities of persons involved in organizing the schedule of visits to farms and agro-farming activities was based on the season. Rural tourism, education activities that can be organized are: floral classes, cooking classes at the farm, the natural course of preparation of herbal remedies, an educational demonstration, farm-type "pizza", mini-zoo animals wild and domestic, historical reconstruction of the village, visiting farms and vegetable agro visiting archaeological sites near agro farms. The specific activities of rural fun tourism, we suggest the following activities: agriculture entertaining, art plant, accommodation in private farms for outdoor sports enthusiasts, the labyrinth of agriculture, tourism for natural heritage and wine tasting. Finally, the tourism activities in the educational and entertainment areas, we suggest: picking fruit and vegetables by visitors

7 agro farm, historic all-inclusive package, touring for the identification of plants and wildlife in their natural habitat and harvest day. In most cases, the presentation of the types of rural tourism activities we mentioned some locations where they could organize these activities Chapter 6, MANAGEMENT AND MARKETING IMPROVEMENT PROGRAMS FARM AND RURAL TOURISM IN TIMIS COUNTY, proposes two routes presented detailed typology that fits perfectly in the specific activities of rural tourism. The first route, the route of travel and tourism book Cenad-Timisoara, is justified by strong emotional populated places, once, Schwabe: municipalities Cenad, Lovrin, Sandra, and Biled (excluding rural route and could possibly be filled with traces Swabians exploration in this part of the country as they can be seen in Timisoara). The second route is one of alternative tourism and tourism in the area Faget, justified by the extraordinary journey ethnographic and folk heritage of the area. Municipalities are included in this route Balint, Barna, Curtea, Fardea, Manastur, Pietroasa and Tomesti in order to reconstructs lifestyle played in pastoral work and folklore. This doctoral thesis was written with the understanding that neither the farm tourism or rural tourism can not be conceived outside a wide range of activities involving aspects of adventure, industry and education. As regards the suggestions made by us, we had to identify declining tourist destinations, innovation in tourism and sustainable tourism development in non-traditional tourist destinations. The present doctoral thesis was developed starting from the idea that neither farm tourism, nor agri-tourism can be conceived without activities involving such aspects as adventure, industry, and education. As for the suggestions made by us, we had in mind the following: - the necessity of identifying declining tourism destinations or tourism destinations that are not enough valued; - the necessity of innovating in tourism; - tourism destinations.