Tourism in Romania

Tourism in Romania

The official logo of Romania, used to promote the tourist attractions in the country
Website http://www.romania.travel/
Calea Victoriei (Victory Avenue)
Moldoveanu Peak from Făgăraș Mountains

Tourism in Romania is focused on the country's natural landscapes and its history, and forms an important component of the economy of Romania. The total number of foreign tourist arrivals in the year 2014 was 1,911,800, an increase of 6.6% from the 2013 number of 1,714,500.[1] In 2014, Romania had 32,500 companies which were active in the hotel and restaurant industry, with a total turnover of EUR 2.6 billion.[2] However, the number of tourists has decreased dramatically in recent years, in fact, in 2004 there were 5,9 millions of tourists.[3] Only in 2012 the number of tourists has started to grow again.

The most visited cities are Bucharest, Brașov, Sibiu, Cluj-Napoca, Timișoara, Iași, and Constanța. The most significant natural attractions are the Danube, the Carpathian Mountains, and the Black Sea.

Activities

Unique places

Turda Gorge seen from the west end

Festivals

Statistics

Foreign visitor arrivals in 2014[1]

Income

In 2006 it was reported that this industry added gross value of $8,074 million to the Romanian economy in 2005.

Facilities for disabled travellers

Facilities for disabled travellers in Romania range from patchy to nonexistent. Anyone with mobility problems should go prepared and ideally have local contacts. Although it has made some slow strides towards disabled access since then, and new buildings need to be wheelchair-accessible, implementation has been very poor. In practice Romania remains by and large off-limits to disabled travellers.[4]

Industrial and creative tourism

Industrial tourism, as a niche of tourism in Romania and as a solution to the restructuring and disappearance of former large industrial sites (mining, metallurgy, heavy industry), takes on interest in the country still slowly, despite the country's join to the European Union in 2007. Even if presently the country is confronted with a long and difficult economic transition, it has a rich industrial and scientific history with many of the world's priorities and still has surviving authentic traditional crafts and rural communities. Limited to some geographic areas and not yet on a large scale, by the means of European funds and projects, a sustainable revival of the traditional sector is supported, which also implies creative tourism participatory activities.[5][6][7]

Against this big potential, there are relatively few entities, the majority being state owned, that are organizing, providing or permitting public visits, a main cause of this still being the weak implication and support of many public authorities. Meanwhile, the tourism stakeholders pay a relatively weak attention to the hard core of this niche (industrial heritage, technique, science and living industry), and practically there aren't many package offers of this kind on the market, with some notable exceptions: ethnographic and wine tourism, also some rehabilitated industrial and forest narrow railways and steam engines still operating.

Primary attractions

According,[8] an industrial and creative tourism attractions web directory for Romania and some neighbouring countries, providing photos and short English descriptions of each objective, the main attractions open to the public are:

Natural Landscapes Gallery

Cultural Landscapes Gallery

See also

References

  1. 1 2 INSSE Romania official figures (Romanian)
  2. ↑ http://www.romania-insider.com/how-important-is-tourism-in-romanias-economy/158787/
  3. ↑ Agentiile de turism, la un pas de a prelua puterea, 30 Mai 2005, Gabriel Dogaru, wall-stret.ro, accesat la 4 iulie 2011
  4. ↑ "Romania for disabled travellers". enchantingromania.com. Retrieved 10 December 2014.
  5. ↑ Gavrila, I.; Muntean, A. (2012). "Industrial Tourism for the Development Of Rosia Montana Area" (PDF). International Journal of Energy and Environment, volume 6.
  6. ↑ Merciu, C. (May 2010). "Tourist Capitalization of Industrial Heritage in Petrosani" (PDF). Geo Journal.
  7. ↑ Imbrescu, I. (2013). "Reviving Rural Industrial Heritage in Romania" (PDF). Conference Spain.
  8. ↑ Hegedus, Marius (November 2014). "Industrial and Creative Tourism Attractions in Romania". VisitFactories.

Further reading

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tourism in Romania.
Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Romania.
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Wednesday, April 20, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.