A research on the development of gastronomy tourism in terms of touristic product diversity: Cappadocia case

The interest in gastronomic tourism is increasing every year. In addition, gastronomic tourism has taken its place among the indispensable elements in terms of diversity in the tourism sector. The need for food and drink, which was called only the physiological needs of people in the early ages, has become one of the types of tourism that people want to enjoy from what they eat and drink and even want to participate for this. As the interest in gastronomic tourism started to increase, the regional managers took action and wanted to provide a competitive advantage and to bring different types of tourism to the forefront, especially in regions lacking sea-sand-sun tourism. One of these types of tourism is gastronomic tourism. For the development of gastronomic tourism in a region, only the product available in the region is not sufficient. At this point, it can be said that stakeholders have great duties for the development of gastronomic tourism in the region. Therefore, in this study, gastronomy tourism was researched in terms of touristic product diversity in the Cappadocia Region and stakeholder opinions on the subject were taken. A structured interview form was used as a data collection method in the study. Eight questions were asked to the participants and the descriptive analysis method, one of the qualitative data analysis methods was used in the analysis of the data. According to the findings obtained from the research, it has been determined that gastronomy tourism has not developed enough in terms of touristic product diversity in the Cappadocia Region. It has been stated that various fairs and festivals should be held in the region related to gastronomy and that gastronomy stakeholders should act together.