Analyzing the ranking of security challenges of tourism development: A case study of Mazandaran Province, Iran - Theory and Practice in Hospitality and Tourism Research - page 570

Table 3. Challenges of tourism security in Mazandaran,
arranged according to importance level in the second
step of Delphi method.

Table 4. Strategies to increase tourism security in Maz-
andaran in the second step of Delphi method.

Row Strategies Number SD

Security challenges
of tourism

Coefficient
of variance Row Average SD 1 Promoting cooperation between

the police and the travel
agencies

4.37 0.51

1 High costs of

residence which
left the tourists
stranded outside
and so decreased
their security level

4.28 0.89 0.21

2 Increasing the safety of the

transportation system

3.87 0.45

3 Establishing security in tourist

sites especially for eco—
tourism tours

3.75 1.03

2 Illegal tourism

facilities

3.96 0.67 0.16

4 Seriously punishing those who

guide tourists illegally

3.50 1.06

3 Lack of security

insurance of
tourists by the
investors of
tourism facilities

3.94 0.64 0.20

5 Familiarizing the tour guides

with security challenges

3 0.75

6 Performing different conferences

and seminars to develop
tourism security

3 1.19

4 Inadequate

cooperation of the
local communities
with the police

3.80 0.59 0.19

5 Unfamiliarity of

tour leaders with
security issues

3.73 0.81 0.13

effective to increase tourism security of Maz-
andaran. Also, according to Table 3, in three strat-
egies, there was a strong agreement among panel
members (SD

6 Lack of a

comprehensive and
strategic program,
and the tourism
aims not defined
in the form of an
executive program

3.64 1.18 0.35

< 1).

4.3 The third step of Delphi method: Agreement
level of panel members with the determined
standards
In the third step, the questions from the first and
second questionnaires were given to the panel
members in the form of a questionnaire in order
to be summed up. Table 5 summarized their agree-
ment level with the ranking.
According to Table 5, agreement percentage
with nine questions is more than 50% are the main
security challenges of tourism in Mazandaran.
Panel members do not consider 'relative weakness
to provide security for historical texture tourists in
not crowded and low traffic hours' as one of the
main challenges of tourism security in the province
(with agreement percentage of less than 50%).
In this step, the Standard Deviation of the
members' answers regarding the strategies used to
increase tourism security decreased from 83 per-
cent in the second step to 69 percent in the third
step. Thus, it can be said that panel members
reached an agreement (consensus).

7 Qualitative and

quantitative
weakness of land
transportation
facilities decreasing
the financial and
life security

3.68 1.15 0.31

8 Lack of security

for investor to
invest in tourism
development

3.55 1.09 0.24

9 Lack of full support

of tourist sites on
the part of the
police because of
their abundance
and distribution

3.47 1.27 0.38

10 Relative weakness to

provide security for
historical texture

2.01 1.16 0.56

4.4 The fourth step of Delphi method: Agreement
level with determined standards (final
summing-up or consensus)
The fourth questionnaire included the adjusted
questions of the third step was given to the
panel members to make the final summing-up

4.2.2 Ranking opinions of panel members about
strategies to increase tourism security
In this step, panel members recognized that from
among the six strategies that they had introduced
in the first step, 'promoting cooperation between
the local communities and the police' is the most