Tourism indicators and their impact on the management of emerging destinations

Resumo

Tourism indicator systems are tools to know the real situation of destinations and constitute a reference to promote public policies focused on sustainable development. In destination management, the indicator system helps direct and indirect actors in decision-making. In this context, we present the research done in the city of Loja-Ecuador, whose objective is to analyze the perception that local actors have on the tourism indicator system for its management. To achieve this aim, a panel of experts was held considering the tourist actors, representatives of public and private institutions in the sector. A questionnaire to collect information was used based on three aspects: the system of indicators, multisectoral organization and associativity. To sum up, there are positives perceptions of the actors related to the indicators system in the destination to establish strategies and improve management. In addition, the actors state that an organizational structure of the sector will contribute to the strengthening of companies, to local development and will bring them business and business-to-business profits.