PERSPECTIVE OF HEALTH TOURISM DEVELOPMENT OF RURAL CROATIA

The current economic crisis still puts a significant impact on the world and Croatian tourism trends, therefore producing the necessity for creating a better and higher quality tourist product. This would enable repositioning of Croatian tourist offer on the tourist market. Health tourism of rural Croatia represents an essential element in the creation of integral rural Croatian tourist product, out of which numerous benefits will be achieved (economic and socio-demographic development of rural areas, overcoming the seasonal character of the tourism offer, meeting the needs of tourists of various profiles and age groups, creating new jobs for domicile population, achieving value for money and experience for money, increasing tourist turnover, etc.) in relation to the competitive tourist destination, and it must be given considerable attention. Despite the rich resource basis, the tourist offer is not developed according to its real potential. The previously mentioned facts point to the necessity of creating strategic guidelines for future development, and undertaking appropriate marketing activities with a goal of achieving competitive advantages. The purpose of the paper is to emphasize the importance of creating a more attractive offer of health tourism of rural Croatia with a goal of strengthening the overall competitiveness of the Croatian tourist product. The objective of the paper is to analyze the current state of health tourism of rural Croatia, and offer a proposal of strategic guidelines with a goal of further development and achievement of competitive advantages in relation to the leading tourist destinations of health tourism.