LONG-RUN FORECASTING OF ECOTOURISM RECEIPTS FOR THE NEEDS OF THE BULGARIAN MUNICIPALITIES

LONG-RUN FORECASTING OF ECOTOURISM RECEIPTS FOR THE NEEDS OF THE BULGARIAN MUNICIPALITIES

PRESLAV DIMITROV

Abstract

Most of the Bulgarian rural and mountainous municipalities need to back up their investment decision in tourism infrastructure by preliminary analysis and forecasts. The present paper regards a specific set of some major problems in the application of exponential smoothing methods for the purpose of the long-run forecasting of the ecotourism receipts (ecotourism revenues) for the needs of the mountainous municipality of Stambolovo, Bulgaria, located near to the border with Greece and Turkey. This specific set of problems comprises: (i) the problem of determining the time series pattern; or the so-called “forecast profile”;(ii)the selection of a suitable forecasting method; (iii) calculating of short-run and long-run forecasts; and (iv) the comparison of the results of the forecast techniques on the basis of the errors in the forecasts. A specially designed model for estimation of the weight coefficient needed for determining the size of the rural tourism and ecotourism sectors of this very same municipality is being presented.

Key words

Long-run forecasting, exponential smoothing, ecotourism, ecotourism receipts

References

ASVESTAS, K., (2012), A Business Plan Prepared by “DataConcept Bulgaria AD” Company for the Creation of a Tourism Information Centre in the municipality of Stambolovo, Main calculations made by Dimitrov, P., (2012), Sofia, Bulgaria

BROWN, R. G.(1959), Statistical Forecasting for Inventory Control, McGraw-Hill, New York

BROWN, R. G.(1963), Smoothing, Forecasting, and Prediction of Discrete Time Series,
Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ

DIMITROV, P., (2012), Long-term Forecasting of the Spa and Wellness sub sector of the Bulgarian Tourism Industry, Tourism Management Studies,Issue No 7, University of Algarve, p. 140-148

DIMITROV, P. (2010),“Short-run forecasting of tourism arrivals in separate sectors of
Bulgarian tourism industry”, International Scientific Conference “Alternatives for Development of the Modern Tourism, The Proceedings Book, 378-389

FILIPOVA M.,(2010), Peculiarities of Project Planning in Tourism, Perspectives of
Innovations Economics and Business /PIEB, International Cross-Industry Research Journal, Prague, Czech Republic, Vol.4, Issue 1, , с. 57-59

GARDNER, E. S. (JUN.)(1985), Exponential Smoothing: the state of the art, Journal of
Forecasting, Issue 4, pp.1-28

GARDNER, E. S. (JUN.)(1987), Chapter 11: Smoothing methods for short-term planning and control, The Handbook of forecasting – A Manager’s Guide, Second Edition, Makridakis, S. and Steven C. Wheelright (Edit.), John Wiley & Sons, USA, pp. 174 -175

HYNDMAN, R. J. ET AL.(2008), Forecasting with Exponential Smoothing –The State
Space Approach, Berlin, Germany, 11-23.

NATIONAL STATISTICAL INSTITUTE (2011 a), Statistical Yearbooks of the People’s
Republic of Bulgaria for the period 1964-1989, available by request through http://www.nsi.bg, accessed 29.09.2011.

NATIONAL STATISTICAL INSTITUTE (2011b), Statistical Yearbooks of the Republic of
Bulgaria for the period 1990-1999, available by request through
http://www.nsi.bg, accessed 29.09.2011.

MINISTRY OF ECONOMY, ENERGY AND TOURISM (2011), Surveys and Analyses 2010, The foreign and the Bulgarian Tourists in Bulgaria – General Observations and Attitudes, A Survey conducted by the “Sinesta” Consortium http://www.mi.government.bg/files/useruploads/files/turism__statistika_i_analizi/prouchvania_proekti/prouchvane_chujdenci_bulgarians_20092010_obshtinabljudenia.pdf, accessed 29.06.2012

PEGLES, C. C.(1969), Exponential forecasting: some new variations, Management
Science, Issue 15(5), pp.311-315

RIBOV, M., PENCEHEVA, A. et Al. (2010), Tourism Policy, “Trakia –M”, Publishing House, Sofia, Bulgaria, pp.241-251

STANKOVA, M. (2010), The Tourism Regions in Bulgaria - Concepts and Challenges, Journal of Tourism & Hospitality Management, 1, 109. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2066730

TAYLOR, J. W. (2003), Exponential Smoothing with a damped multiplicative trend,
International Journal of Forecasting, Issue 19, pp.715-725

Full Text: PDF (English)