Sustainable tourism in inner areas. The case of Val di Vara (Liguria, Italy)

The study presents the very preliminary research of a PhD project which focuses on Val di Vara and is aimed at creating territorial management opportunities and sustainable tourism by promoting landscape values, involving local communities and enhancing cultural and natural resources contributing to reduce rural depopulation. With particular reference to the framework of sustainable development policies for depressed areas at international and national levels presented above, the Val di Vara is particularly significant for two reasons: firstly, rural depopulation it went through from the 1950s and which is still ongoing; secondly, recent programmes and initiatives carried out to stop this trend and attract tourists, taking advantage of its favourable position. Despite being in the inland area, the valley is very close to the Eastern Riviera of Liguria (Portofino, Cinque Terre) and to Tuscany. Its location provides great potential of tourism development as an alternative to mass tourism destinations also thanks to its large offer of outdoor and recreational opportunities as well as cultural heritage (including traditional villages, the so called “Borghi”) and rich landscape values. In the long term the project entails the identification and analysis of potential and critical elements of current tourism management policies in terms of offer and use. In this sense, a significant starting point is the diverse range of environmental, landscape, cultural, historic- artistic and traditional food and wine offer.