Cultural indicators of tourism sustainability in Serbian spas

Abstract

This paper analyses cultural indicators, one of five groups of comparative indicators of sustainable tourism, defined and suggested to the European Commission by a team of experts. The group of cultural indicators includes indicators such as the ratio of accommodation capacities to the number of population, and tourism intensity and they show the level of preservation of local population identity. The statistical data from the last four census year were used in the analysis of cultural indicators of tourism sustainability in spa settlements in Serbia. The ratio of accommodation capacities to the number of local population can be defined as favourable in most spas (green zone), since there is no intensive tourist construction (apart from illegal construction), while the tourism intensity based on the example of Serbian spa settlements points at very unfavourable situation, since in all four census years the recorded, the results are in the red zone, i.e. on the one hand, there is a relatively low number of local population and on the other hand, there is a high number of overnight stays.