Rural Tourism and Visitors' Expenditures for Local Food Products

Abstract

European rural development policy has supported the production of local and regionally denominated food as a mean to differentiate agricultural production and rural tourism as a mean to diversify rural employment. The aim of the present work is to address the tourists’ decision to buy local food products while visiting lagging rural areas and the amount of money spent over these products. The findings of this work should be of particular interest to practitioners of rural development as they point out to possible market segmentation and communication potentials and reflect on differences between accessible and less accessible rural areas.