A Feasibility Study of Tourism Investment Opportunities: The Case of Tarom as an International Recreational-Tourist Town

The significant role of investment in the process of societies’ economic growth and development is highlighted in most theories on economic growth and development. Taking into account the shortage of investment sources and the necessity of optimal allocation of these sources for promoting economic growth, it is necessary to rightly identify the relative advantages of a country as regards the allocation of investment sources and also direct investment sources in most productive and efficient sectors in order to provide for efficient use of limited sources to accelerate economic growth. Thus, it is much necessary to use the scientific methods of economic engineering and economic evaluation of projects to onomically and financially evaluate investment projects. This descriptive, analytic and applied study evaluates economic indicators of investment in Tarom (located in Zanjan Province) as an international recreational-tourist town via different criteria of economic and financial evaluation and the use of COMFAR (A computer software for simulating the financial and economic situation of investment projects). The results indicated that conducting the project of Tarom Recreational-Tourist Town has no justification in terms of indicators of financial and economic evaluation.