Localization Process of Sustainable Development Indicators of Rural Tourism in Iran

Introduction The concept of sustainable tourism industry has been discussed over the past decades as one of the most important as well as contentious debates of tourism development and as a framework for understanding the socio-economicdevelopment procedures along with natural resource management and tourism all over the world. This concept has been identified as a delicate balance in a triangular relationship between the host community and the land on the one hand with the guest community on the other hand with the tourism industry at different local, national and world levels. Complexity and problematic nature of this concept and its implementation method along with methodology to measure the progress toward sustainability in tourism has turned it to a challenge for many scientists and researchers; so applying indicators and indices capable in estimating tourism sustainability and enabling sustained tourism development seems to be necessary.On the other hand, regarding the present situation in rural tourism in the country andrecent establishment of many rural tourism destinations, having an appropriate set oflocalized indicators of sustainable development of rural tourism for assessing thesituation and sketching the future course is vital and strategic. Many scientistsbelieve that "good sustainability information" will pave the way for optimumdecision making and planning progress towards the course of sustainabledevelopment of rural tourism in the future. Hence, in this the paper also the keyresearch questions have been as follows: 1. What are the appropriate indicators andcriteria for measuring progress towards sustainable development of rural tourism inthe country? 2. Which process provides for the appropriate indicators and criteria tomeasure sustainable development of rural tourism in this country?Therefore, this paper has dealt with representing appropriate indicators and criteria(localized) to measure progress towards sustainability in tourism industry in Iranusing analytical and descriptive survey and field interviews of teachers, experts andspecialists by using Delphi method.MethodologyThe main purpose of the article has been to achieve a series of appropriate and indigenous sustainable development indicators in rural tourism of Iran. Hence, it attempts to realize this target by using analytical-descriptive methods withdocumentary style (reading many books and articles in libraries and searching inInternet) and survey (padding of experts and professionals). For analyzing the data,statistical methods such as variance and Mean and various and software such asExcel and SPSS have been used.FindingsBased on research findings, a total of 80 indicators have been obtained to assess sustainable rural tourism out of which 22 indicators have been used to assess social sustainability, 24 indicators to assess economic sustainability and 34 indicators toassess environmental sustainability. All of these are suitable for structure of Iranianvillages and they are environment friendly as well.ConclusionLocalization process of indicators according to international experiences and views of local experts in addition to extracting indicators of sustainable development of rural tourism in the country led to another result which is mentioned below: Possibility of operational criteria of empirical tests: Selected Indicators according tothe conditions and requirements of state land, the realm of space tourism andinformation gathering systems etc. have been produced in the country, and theproper factors are considered to measure the stability and those are quality testingand operational capabilities in the country rural.Sustainable development tourism and Localization of indicators: Sustainable tourismdevelopment has created appropriate methods to explain the Localization of tourismsustainability indicators and measurement that show its use in extracting indicatorsrural tourism is now considered to have an inevitable necessity.Internal and external adjustment of indicators: Designing and organization of ruraltourism sustainability indicators adopted a unified approach from themethodological view point and include all aspects of rural tourism destinations lifeand geographical context of their lives as well. Hence selected indicators from thefollowing content and spatial foundations of thought, planning and administrativestructure requirements in full and together they complement each other and the otherwith its external environment are compatible.