Identifying the Agritourism Development Strategy and Evaluating the Role of Effective Actors in Its Implementation in Golestan Province

This study seeks to identify agritourism development strategies in Golestan province.

Design/methodology/approach:

 For this purpose, the SWOT matrix was quantified with 19 weaknesses, 12 strengths, 14 threats, and 15 opportunities by forty experts from relevant institutions. According to the results, the optimal strategy of the province for the development of agritourism will be a "conservative" strategy. To achieve this goal, designed eight strategies to develop agritourism in the Golestan province. Then, the attitude of decision-making institutions in the development of agritourism towards the strategies identified in the previous stage was identified and evaluated based on the analysis of the MACTOR.

The results show that none of the institutions is opposed to the implementation of the eight strategies, but the priority is to implement the strategy of "transparency of laws and regulations by creating a single window for licensing and reducing bureaucracy and bureaucracy to establish agritourism businesses" have been.

  In addition, the results show that the lowest degree of convergence between the views of organizations is related to agriculture with the police, environment with the police, and culture and tourism with the police. Also, evaluating the degree of convergence of strategies with each other showed that there was a different degree of convergence between different strategies.

Originality/value:

 Identification of agricultural tourism development strategies for Golestan province and also analysis of the role of decision-making institutions in the implementation of these strategies.