Sustainable Development Mountain Tourism in Iran

 Tourism is significant among countries and all over the world considered mountain tourism because of its advantages. Despite its rare nature and unique mountainous attractions, Iran has not been able to gain its share of this industry. This study aimed to explain the sustainable mountain tourism development model in Iran.

 This is an applicable and descriptive-analytical study. It used semi-organized interviews with 22 mountain tourism experts, and the study of library documents collected preliminary data. Then, a researcher-made questionnaire was designed and validated using experts' opinions, consultation with advisors, and the views of eight experts. The reliability of this questionnaire, which had 123 items, was confirmed by Cronbach's alpha (α=0.973) and distributed among the samples, including 576 mountain tourists, guides and experts of mountain tourism, and village council officials of mountainous areas by simple random sampling. Various tests, such as King and Horrocks thematic analysis, Kolmogorov-Smirnov, and exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis used to analyze the data.

 The findings of the qualitative section include 100 descriptive codes, 29 interpretive codes, and three broad themes. The results of the quantitative team showed that the factors of sustainable development of mountain tourism are infrastructure in four sub-sectors, attractiveness in two sub-sectors including natural and artificial attractions, and sustainability factor in six sub-sectors. The Standardized Root Mean Square Residual and the Normed Fit Index showed that the research model has a desirable and acceptable fit.

Originality: 

This article has determined the primary and practical factors, the relationship between these factors, and the explanation of the sustainable development model of mountain tourism in Iran. The purpose of doing it is to expand the existing knowledge for the usage of the stakeholders in mountain tourism.