Classification of poviats in terms of the degree of development of their tourist function

Abstract

The development of a tourist function, which is one of the factors of local development in Poland, varies from region to region. The aim of the article is to determine the optimal method for dividing Polish poviats in terms of the degree of development of their tourism function. The study draws upon the division of gminas (the smallest administrative units in Poland) into five classes, proposed by Jadwiga Warszyńska in 1985. The classification of poviats in this study was performed on the basis of the values of four tourist function indicators: Baretje-Defert’s index, the density of accommodation index, the Schneider index and Defert’s index. Threshold values determined for these indicators, which define a fullydeveloped tourism function of a poviat, made it possible to distinguish the fifth class. The remaining four classes were determined by dividing the values of the considered indicators below the threshold value. To this end, various methods of the selection of the class intervals have been used, including the Jenks, the geometric progress, the k-means, and the head-tail method. The precision of the obtained class intervals was compared using the GVF (Goodness of Variance Fit) and TAI (Tabular Accuracy Index) indicators. The selection of the optimal division allowed the performance of the classification of poviats in terms of the degree of development of their tourist function. The obtained results were illustrated on the example of data for 2019. The study used data on Polish poviats for 2002–2019 from the Local Data Bank of Statistics Poland. The analysis demonstrated that the poviats with the highest degree of development of the tourist function were the least numerous group and constituted 6.3% of all Polish poviats. Poviats located in the western and the central part of the Polish sea coast comprised half of this group, while the rest were large urban centers and poviats located in the Bieszczady, Tatra and the Karkonosze Mountains as well as in the Polish Lake District (Mazury).