Explaining the Creative Tourism Development Strategies of Rasht City

Investing in projects, according to the industrial development guide of United Nations, is the use and allocation of economic resources to achieve long-term benefits. The use of the word profit instead of resources is due to the fact that the purpose of investing is not limited to net profit and loss, but also has other benefits. One of these benefits includes the use of the tourism industry, which has developed in the world, especially in developed countries, as a large sector along with other economic ones. And it can become a basic industry along with other fundamental ones such as agriculture, industry and services. The city of Rasht is located as one of the largest urban centers on the southern shore of the Caspian Sea, which has natural features, topographic features, river-valleys, forests, sea and historical sites. In recent years, despite holding various exhibitions and urban events and using the environmental protection force and special attention to sustainable development, management of Rasht city has not been able to make appropriate exploit of the city's potential. Absence of strategic vision and lack of attention to the rich cultural characteristics of the people of Rasht, has caused the city to lose its balance of strategic planning structures. The city of Rasht is considered as an attractive and cheap destination for tourists, but there is still no suitable place to compete in the world. Therefore, the explanation of creative urban tourism development strategies is as a concern in the field of urban planning that can increase GDP.

In order to achieve the method and methodology of this study, a qualitative study has been conducted with the grounded theory approach. The reason for choosing the grounded theory is that executive techniques can be achieved based on this one. The aim of the present study is to evaluate the situation of Rasht city in the aspect of creative city indicators. At first, it reviews the indicators used in the world, and after selecting the indicators in accordance with the background conditions of this city, it measures and quantifies them. The purpose of this study is not only to evaluate the creative city indicators of Rasht, but also the main goal of this research is to exploit the potentials of Rasht city, to provide solutions for urban creativity and to apply practical strategies to attract domestic and foreign investment based on achieved strategies of the research results. According to the above, it can be said that the present study seeks to answer the questions as follow:-What is the situation of the creative city indicators in Rasht city?
-What are the appropriate strategies for the development of creative tourism of Rasht city?The present research is descriptive-quantitative one with applied nature. In order to collect information, 393 questionnaires were completed through residents. The data were analyzed by using of binomial tests, correlation and exploratory factor analysis(EFA). Then, after analyzing the statistical data, the proposed strategies are presented through the SOAR strategic model.

From the data analysis, several central categories have been obtained: Restrictions of Rasht city, popular culture, undesirable social structure, uneven and dysfunctional management, lack of urban infrastructure, dysfunctional transportation system, weakness of education, overlapping tasks of organizations and poor advertising in underdeveloped tourism have cause confusion and imbalance in urban sustainable development and also have influenced strategies.

According to the consequences of the adopted strategies and based on the definitions of events, tourism and sustainable development, it can be argued that the city of Rasht does not have thorough cultural facilities and it is not possible to hold various events. One of the considered and inferred strategies, is the creation of food festivals during different seasons, which can be useful for the development of tourism and introducing the local food of this city to domestic and foreign tourists. Teaching traditional foods of this city to tourists is another achieved strategy of the research. Because in today's modern world, tourists are not just looking for entertainment; their basic need is to acquire the indigenous culture of cities and countries and to spread it in their own country. According to the research and the results of the analysis in order to achieve the objectives of the research, there is a basic need to create valuable and educational places. Establishing guidance centers in the city and holding training courses are other strategies that we have witnessed a lack of them. Considering the capacities of Rasht city in the field of creative gastronomy city and suitable cultural contexts among the people of Rasht city, it can be expected the development of tourism with increasing the quality of services and products based on providing the necessary training as one of the requirements of sustainable development, in addition to creating the platform for people to benefit from the brand of creative gastronomy city.