Planning and Promotion of Sustainable Tourism Development in Macedonia

Due to the fact that tourism generates many impacts which are contributing to the overall economic development, the inevitable connection is evident to the process of state, regional and community planning. This study addresses the role of government in its efforts for undertaking tourism policy that ensures hosting visitors by maximizing the benefits to all involved stakeholders, while minimizing the negative impacts associated with accomplishing successful destination. This has been a priority task to all governments, particularly to small and developing countries as Macedonia. So, the research addresses the role of government in its efforts for planning and promoting sustainable tourism development in Macedonia. Several key areas of governmental influence on tourism development are assessed based on available primary and secondary sources of desk-research. The paper is reach on comparable quantities analyzed by descriptive statistics with a data set generally covering a twenty year horizon and over. Despite the significant governmental efforts, the up-to-date results point to modest and limited outcomes with regards to the sustainable tourism development. This empirical evidence underlines the importance of government actions, support and encouragement as a prerequisite for well-established tourism planning process in the line of accomplishing positive impacts with larger extends