EXPLORING TOURISM POTENTIAL IN CENTRAL ASIA - Tourism in Central Asia: Cultural Potential and Challenges - page 6

CONTRIBUTION OF THIS TOPIC
As we know, the global tourism landscape continually changes. Political,
economic, cultural, and technological forces interplay to determine where
and when tourists travel. That is, the confluence of these forces shape push
and pull factors. While challenges still exist and will always exist to some
extent in every tourism market, many factors appear to indicate that the
Central Asia region (also termed the Silk Road region) is ripe for future
tourism development. The region is rich with historical, cultural, and natu-
ral beauty that could provide significant utility to many potential visitors.
This topic is an attempt to house key writings on this topic in a single
resource. Publications addressing tourism development opportunities and
challenges in Central Asia are few in number in comparison to the atten-
tion afforded to tourism development in many other regions of the world.
More speciically, a number of topics address tourism development in
other world regions [such as, Europe: McCabe, Minnaert, and Diekmann
(2011); North America: Chandana (2003); South America: Santana (2001);
South-east Asia: Hitchcock, King, and Parnwell (2009)], but Central Asia
has received little explicit attention. This project was initiated to address
this void. In summary, we intend to make this topic a major bibliographic
resource for all academic researchers and practitioners interested in issues
dealing with the development of tourism, its potential and challenges, and
policy and regulatory issues in Central Asian countries.
OVERVIEW OF THE CONTENTS
More than 15 prominent researchers have contributed their time and talent
to this project. We invited those researchers who have the knowledge and
expertise to energize further examination and attention to the topic of tour-
ism development along the Silk Road to be contributors. The passion of
the contributors regarding this subject area shines through in the coming
chapters. They infuse their passion into their writings when communicat-
ing their expertise regarding their respective topics.
The first two contributions, Chapter 2 (Baisakalova and Garkavenko)
and Chapter 3 (Tiberghien, Garkavenko and Milne) provide detailed ana-
lyzes of tourism development in Kazakhstan. As outlined by the authors,
Kazakhstan, with its abundant natural and cultural resources, has a great