Assessing the Rural Tourism Role in the Sustainable Development of Local Communities (Case Study: Tourism Destination Villages - Zanjan Province)

Rural tourism has been discussed with regard to various functions and high ability to connect with other economic sectors as a strategy for socio-economic development of rural areas. The purpose of this study was to assess the role of tourism on sustainable development of rural areas of Zanjan province. The present research is applied in a descriptive-analytical manner and library and field methods have been used to collect data. The statistical population of the study is 8 villages of tourism target of Zanjan province. According to the census of 1395, the total number of households in these villages is 2,584 households. Using Cochran formula, the sample size was calculated to complete the questionnaire of 243 samples. The face validity of the questionnaire was examined from experts' point of view and the reliability of the variables was calculated by Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 76%. For quantitative data analysis, statistical tests such as (single instance t, regression, Kruskal-Wallis) have been used. The results show that tourism development has a positive effect on economic, socio-cultural and physical indicators and negative impact on the environmental index. Also, in the regression fit model, the coefficient of determination was equal to (0.842), which indicates the positive effect of rural tourism on the dimensions of independent research variables. The ranking of Kruskal-Wallis test also shows that the villages of Maire, Sokrizi, Hajji Siran, Sheyt, respectively, have been most influential in rural tourism in the region.