Regenerative tourism: New perspectives for Italian inland areas

The implementation of sustainable tourism is not realized in a short time because a lot of elements are multifaced and ambiguous, and the impacts are not yet clear all in the future. Nevertheless, nowadays, all stakeholders are involved in the establishment of sustainable tourism, but they need to face high costs in real time. However, the benefits are moved in time, often not in line with the entrepreneur"s expectations. To this end, it seems appropriate that the tourist system needs to develop a new business model, which can realize added value and be compatible with the physical, cultural, and social environment to meet the requirements of territories and global challenges. This chapter aims to test regenerative tourism, as already defined by many authors, as a useful model for the tourism development of inland areas, especially in Italy. Regenerative tourism, in fact, needs several steps to achieve a new tourist development. The first step is the analysis of the environmental, social, cultural, and economic wealth that can be valorized in the tourist model. In the second step, the local community chooses the resources to valorize in tourist service, without depriving the inhabitants and the territories of resources but - in the third step - to add a new way of their use in line with the goals of the 2030 Agenda. This vision applied to Italian inland areas can be a new way of economic, social, cultural, and environmental growth, as an opportunity not only for raising the quality and accessibility of resources but also a driving factor for creative experiences that can add cultural value to both community local and tourists.