Presenting the ecotourism model with an emphasis on entrepreneurship and sustainable rural employment with a mixed approach

The life and atmosphere of rural society is full of work and employment, but the majority of people seeking work in cities are this group; Ecotourism can once again gather these people in the village environment. This research was also conducted with the aim of designing a model for ecotourism with emphasis on entrepreneurship and sustainable rural employment with two qualitative and quantitative approaches. The statistical population of this research in the qualitative phase were the managers and senior experts of the cultural heritage and tourism organization of Ardabil province, and in the quantitative phase, the employees of the cultural heritage and tourism organization. To determine the sample size in the qualitative stage, the snowball sampling method was used and 20people were selected, and in the quantitative stage, due to the use of the structural equation modeling method, the enumeration method was used instead of sampling, and finally 208 questionnaires were analyzed. The tool of data collection in the qualitative phase was an in-depth interview with experts, which was conducted in three rounds using the Delphi method, and in the quantitative phase, a researcher-made questionnaire resulting from the qualitative phase was used. Based on the results of the research, 40 indicators identified for the model, in 7 dimensions; Natural potentials, social and cultural factors, ecotourism infrastructures and facilities, educational and promotion factors, economic growth, policy and tourism potentials were classified. Confirmatory factor analysis using Amos software showed that all indicators of ecotourism construct have high factor loading and were confirmed.