The Development of Rural Tourism Needs Greater State Support

In Croatia, there are currently about 500 family farms that additionally engage in tourism, which is relatively small compared to the potential of this segment of tourism, and for stronger development, broader support is needed, including better legal regulations and greater state assistance. This is the message from Dijana Katica, president of the Croatian Association for Tourism and Rural Development Club of Members Village, ahead of the 4th International Congress on Rural Tourism, which will be held in Supetar on the island of Brač, organized by this association from May 9 to 13, gathering 250 participants from 15 countries.

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The congress will address numerous current topics for this segment of tourism, as well as from other sectors that are important for its development, and under the title “New Time – Time for Rural Tourism,” it will propose some solutions for a more adequate development of rural tourism, which includes rural and agritourism.

Noting that of the total 500 tourist family farms in Croatia, the majority, or about 80 percent, are excursion farms, which means they have tasting rooms and offer only visits to the estate, while only 20 percent have accommodation capacities, Katica emphasizes that this could change with broader support from both state and local levels, as well as banks with targeted loans.

Most in Istria, along with Dubrovnik and in Baranja

“The prospects for rural tourism in Croatia are great, especially since it is known that about 90 percent of Croatian territory is rural, but so far this segment has mostly developed where tourism is most developed, in Istria and in Konavle near Dubrovnik, and in the last couple of years in Baranja. All family farms engaged in tourism continue this year with development and stronger activities, and in Baranja, the creation of a rural tourism branding strategy has been announced,” says Katica.

She adds that they have also made stronger progress in Zagora, and she considers the Croatian Zagorje a good example, where all tourist family farms, as well as others in the tourism chain, have integrated into a joint branding of the entire destination under the motto “fairy tales at your fingertips,” creating a connection with spas, hotels, gastronomy, and others.

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They have also, as she says, ‘advanced’ in Međimurje County, where the excellent example is the Sv. Martin Spa on the Mura, which purchases about 60 percent of the necessary products from local family farms, thus helping and promoting them, and recently they introduced bicycles with baskets for guests who want to explore the surroundings and buy products from family farms along the way.

There is also a great opportunity for development in Lika-Senj County, which currently does not have many tourist family farms, but they have good conditions due to rich natural and cultural-historical heritage and the possibility of various thematic routes to which various tourist products can be linked.

National Promotion Needed

“Most family farms that also engage in tourism are profitable and liquid, but they lack funds for investment in promotion, and they also have difficulty obtaining part of the loans, as it does not seem profitable to banks,” assesses Katica, emphasizing that the main promotion of these households is based on word of mouth as the best channel.

Unfortunately, as she says, there is still no national catalog or brochure for rural tourism, which was promised to be created by the Croatian Tourist Board (HTZ), as well as stronger promotion of rural tourism, and more adequate legal regulations would also be welcome.

“Family farms find everything quite complicated, as they are practically subject to about 70 different regulations, and almost every ministry directly or indirectly touches on them. For example, they can have 11 different inspections, so we believe that a special law on rural tourism should be adopted, which would not only include family farms but also all others providing tourism and hospitality services in rural areas,” says Katica.

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However, as such a law is difficult to expect, another possibility, she says, is to adequately define this area in the law on hospitality activities, which is currently under public discussion.

In this regard, they proposed to the Ministry of Tourism that new types of facilities be introduced into that law and the accompanying regulations on categorization, as currently, only family farms exist, and rural tourism is not just that, but everything that happens in those areas.

“Once we called family farms that also engage in tourism tourist peasant farms or households, but that has been abolished, and now we only have family farms, of which there are about 160,000 in Croatia. Therefore, we wanted either to restore the old name or to distinguish the existing 500 tourist family farms, which are all special in their own way, by name, which could be resolved by the law on hospitality activities. However, we do not know whether the Ministry of Tourism accepted that proposal or not, as no one has contacted us about it,” says Katica.

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She believes that greater attention should be paid to domestic guests for the development of rural tourism in Croatia, and that they should be enabled to visit and stay in villages and other rural areas more easily and frequently with the help of the CRO card or something similar.

“State assistance is needed for the development and strengthening of rural tourism just as it is for the development of tourism in the continental part of the country, because without that, those areas will not be able to develop anything on their own, especially in a situation where many residents are leaving due to a lack of perspective, which would also be a social and demographic benefit,” concludes Katica.