The creative tourism management model of khu bua community, Ratchaburi

Abstract

The purposes of this research were to study the potential of creative tourism resources and the creative tourism management model of Khu Bua community, Ratchaburi. This research was qualitative. The research tools were the in-depth interview and focus-group. The target groups were local people consisting of community leaders, entrepreneurs, merchants and government officials working in the area and tourist groups. The accidental sampling was applied for selecting tourist groups and the purposive sampling for other key informants. The data was analyzed by content analysis. The research results were as follows: 1. It was found that Khu Bua community’s potential for creative tourism were community history, the ancient city area of Ban Khu Bua, Thai-yuan cultural identity and community readiness. 2. As for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and obstacles of Khu Bua Community's Internal and External Environment, the community strengths were famous woven fabrics, ancient tourist sites, occupational groups’ product development and promotion, learning centers, and an easily accessible location. The community weaknesses were a lack of career knowledge, skills and experiences; no land of their own; without descendants’ awareness of their roots as well as no successors to the community culture. The community opportunities were more communicational channels, the official tourism promotion policy and the increase of cultural tourism trend. The community obstacles were consumerism, social change and lack of integration and linkage between central and local authorities. 3. Opinions and demands of tourists towards creative tourism in Khu Bua community were: 1. Due to the community tourist attractions information, most tourists got the information from online social media. 2. According to tour time, the tour in the community took no more than half a day. 3. As for the knowledge and understanding of creative tourism of the community, most tourists replied that they participated in various activities the community planned. 4. Due to creative tourism activities, the demand for the community activities mainly focused on learning about the Thai-yuan identity and local ancient sites. 5. According to the problem or suggestion for the creative tourism of the community, most tourists suggested that there should be various channels directly informed by its responsible agency. 4. There were two models of creative tourism management for Khu Bua Community, Ratchaburi including (1) tourism models changing from high-class cultural products to everyday cultural ones and (2) tourism models allowing tourists to participate in local community tourism activities. As for the community creative tourism management, there were two phases: the experience and product creation phase and the product delivery and service phase.