A methodology and algorithms for an optimal identification of Tourist Local Systems

In last years, despite the emphasis on the importance of tourism as a leading industry in the development of a country’s economy, there is a lack of criteria and methodologies for the identification, the promotion and the governance of Tourism Local Systems (TLS). Moreover, nowadays an important debate is more and more emerging on the sustainable tourism development which involve three interconnected aspects: environmental, socio-cultural and economic. To this end, in this paper, a rigorous mathematical model is proposed for the optimal identification and dimensioning of TLS. The model here presented consists of a two stage methodology: at first, all the factors that characterize a geographic area to be a Tourist Local System are examined. By these factors and their proper quantification all the territorial units considered are hierarchy ordered. This is useful either for reducing considerably the number of all the admissible solutions or in terms of possible financing plans, political actions and socio-economic targets. Afterward, all the admissible TLS are generated through an algorithm (ALGOTLS) and finally the optimization problem is solved by means of a decision tree approach and the dynamic programming technique (ALGOTT).