Tourism in Romania

Tourism in Romania

The official logo of Romania, used to promote the tourist attractions in the country
Website http://www.romania.travel/
Calea Victoriei (Victory Avenue) in Bucharest

Tourism in Romania is focused on the country's natural landscapes and its history.

Romania attracted 9.33 million foreign tourists in 2016, according to the Worldbank.[1]

Romania’s tourism sector had a direct contribution of EUR 2.09 billion to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2015, slightly higher than in 2014, placing Romania on the 72nd place in the world, ahead of Slovakia and Bulgaria, but behind Croatia and the Czech Republic. The total tourism sector’s total contribution to Romania’s economy, which also takes into account the investments and spending determined by this sector, was some EUR 8.3 billion in 2015, up by 3.4% compared to 2014.[2]

In the first 3 months of the year 2017, there were 2.06 millions of foreign tourists. Compared to the same 3 months of the previous year, arrivals increased by 10.9% and overnight stays in accommodation establishments increased by 7.1%.[3]

The most visited cities are Bucharest, Brașov, Sibiu, Cluj-Napoca, Timișoara, Iași, and Constanța. The most significant natural attractions are the Danube, the Carpathian Mountains, and the Black Sea.

UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Romania

Voroneț Monastery with its unique shade of blue, known as "Voroneț blue".

Activities

Unique places

Turda Gorge seen from the west end
A part of the old town of Sighișoara
A part of Lipscani street in Bucharest's old town
The Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest
Mountainous landscape in Cozia National Park

Festivals

Foreign visitors by country

Most visitors arriving to Romania on short term basis in 2016 were from the following countries:[7]

Rank Country Number
1 Germany 281,704
2 Israel 251,908
3 Italy 233,787
4 France 145,584
5 United Kingdom 140,594
6 Hungary 138,103
7 United States 137,586
8 Poland 102,854
9 Spain 97,661
10 Bulgaria 66,009
Total foreign 2,471,412

Facilities for disabled travellers

Facilities for disabled travellers in Romania range from patchy to nonexistent. Anyone with mobility problems should go prepared and ideally have local contacts. Although it has made some slow strides towards disabled access since then, and new buildings need to be wheelchair-accessible, implementation has been very poor. In practice Romania remains by and large off-limits to disabled travellers.[8]

Industrial and creative tourism

Industrial tourism, as a niche of tourism in Romania and as a solution to the restructuring and disappearance of former large industrial sites (mining, metallurgy, heavy industry), takes on interest in the country still slowly, despite the country's join to the European Union in 2007. Even if presently the country is confronted with a long and difficult economic transition, it has a rich industrial and scientific history with many of the world's priorities and still has surviving authentic traditional crafts and rural communities. Limited to some geographic areas and not yet on a large scale, by the means of European funds and projects, a sustainable revival of the traditional sector is supported, which also implies creative tourism participatory activities.[9][10][11]

Against this big potential, there are relatively few entities, the majority being state owned, that are organizing, providing or permitting public visits, a main cause of this still being the weak implication and support of many public authorities. Meanwhile, the tourism stakeholders pay a relatively weak attention to the hard core of this niche (industrial heritage, technique, science and living industry), and practically there aren't many package offers of this kind on the market, with some notable exceptions: ethnographic and wine tourism, also some rehabilitated industrial and forest narrow railways and steam engines still operating.

Primary attractions

According,[12] an industrial and creative tourism attractions web directory for Romania and some neighbouring countries, providing photos and short English descriptions of each objective, the main attractions open to the public are:

Infrastructure

There are 16 international commercial airports in service today. Overall, airports in the country were transited in 2016 by 16.4 million passengers. The largest number of passengers was attracted by Bucharest's Henri Coandă International Airport, which closed the year with a traffic of almost 11 million passengers.[13]

Romania also has a large network of railways, CIA World Factbook lists Romania with the 22nd largest railway network in the world.[14] The railway network is significantly interconnected with other European railway networks.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Worldbank Tourism in Romania". worldbank.org. Retrieved 2017-05-05.
  2. ↑ "??". Retrieved 2017-05-05.
  3. ↑ "??" (PDF). Retrieved 2017-05-05.
  4. ↑ "Painted Easter eggs, a folkloric tradition in Romania | Photo gallery". www.webphoto.ro. Retrieved 2017-04-25.
  5. ↑ "Mocănița Huțulca (Moldovița)". Județul SUCEAVA (in Romanian). Retrieved 2017-04-25.
  6. ↑ http://www.theworldgeography.com/2013/01/unique-waterfalls.html
  7. ↑
  8. ↑ "Romania for disabled travellers". enchantingromania.com. Retrieved 10 December 2014.
  9. ↑ Gavrila, I.; Muntean, A. (2012). "Industrial Tourism for the Development Of Rosia Montana Area" (PDF). International Journal of Energy and Environment, volume 6.
  10. ↑ Merciu, C. (May 2010). "Tourist Capitalization of Industrial Heritage in Petrosani" (PDF). Geo Journal.
  11. ↑ Imbrescu, I. (2013). "Reviving Rural Industrial Heritage in Romania" (PDF). Conference Spain.
  12. ↑ Hegedus, Marius (November 2014). "Industrial and Creative Tourism Attractions in Romania". VisitFactories.
  13. ↑
  14. ↑ The World Factbook, Country Comparison: Railways

Further reading

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