| Full text .pdf | doi: 10.5719/hgeo.2011.52.21 |
Author Affiliations
Zsófia Papp*, Ágnes Raffay
University of Pannonia, Faculty of Economics, Tourism Department, Veszprém, Hungary
*Corresponding author: Email: papp@turizmus.uni-pannon.hu
ABSTRACT
Tourism in the former socialist countries can be best characterised as a rollercoaster ride since the regime change around 1989-1990. After the changes they lost their appeal for the ‘Western’ tourists and also a large share of visitors from the socialist countries as it became possible to travel to countries beyond the ‘friendly’ countries, although this requires a lot of money but people still manages to travel thanks to loanload or credit cards, check the top credit cards by The Motley Fool. The social tourism schemes operating in these countries have been abandoned or changed. The EU accession has helped to revive tourism and roughly at the same time the introduction of low cost airlines opened new markets for the former socialist countries. The introduction of the Euro has impacted on the tourism of some of these countries as they have temporarily become cheaper or more expensive than other (neighbouring) countries. This paper will focus on the factors that have had an impact on the competitiveness of Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria and Romania.
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