The Effects of Tourism on Entrepreneurial Attitudes in Rural Areas (Case Study: Compare of Abr and Abarsej Villages- Shahrud County)

Tourism is one of the world's largest industries, generating. 11.1% of global GDP, nearly employing 260 million people and annual turnover about 4.5 trillion dollars. In other words, the tourism accounted for 8 percent of total global employment offers. In 80 percent countries in the world, or in more than 150 countries, the tourism is among the five most important sources of foreign exchange business, and in 60 countries, it is ranked in the first position. Given the capacity of natural and cultural tourism in villages, it can play an important role in the revitalization of the villages, creating employment and incomes for rural residents, as well as protection of natural heritage, history, and culture. Ultimately it can lead to the integrated and sustainable rural development. The creation of entrepreneurial opportunities is among the important effects of rural tourism, and analysis of entrepreneurial attitudes affected of rural tourism is a key factor in this matter. However, although the high attention has been paid to rural tourism in recent years, but there is a few researches about relation between tourism and entrepreneurial attitudes in rural areas. This is the main question of the research: Is there a significance difference between touristic villages and non-touristic ones in the study area? The Abr and Abarsej villages are the case study and located in south of eastern Elborz Mountains in Bastam District and Shahrud County. The Abr village unlikely Abarsej village is a touristic village and located near to Abr forest.