INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVE ASSESSMENT

The Strategic Management Model developed in Chapter 4 consists of three main components: international competitive assessment, destination strategic direction and positioning and critical success factor identification and integration. The purpose of this chapter is to examine the international competitive assessment component of the model. One of the goals of tourism planning is to create more valuable tourism products and services for existing and potential target markets so that destinations and their communities receive social and economic benefits [Yoon, 2002: 28]. However, it has been suggested that there is a need for a clearer understanding of the ability of the tourism destination to compete effectively in the international market [Evan et al ,, 1995; Ritchie & Crouch, 2000]. A number of studies have introduced and applied the concept of competitiveness in the area of tourism destination planning [Bordas, 1994, Crouch & Ritchie, 1999; Buhalis, 2000 and Kozak, 2001]