Territory, tourism and local products. The extra virgin oil's enhancement and promotion: a benchmarking Italy-Spain

Purpose – This paper intends to highlight how local tourism development is strongly oriented towards policy development based on the combination typical product-territory, in particular extra virgin olive oil, which assigns value to identity, social capital and indigenous cultural heritage. Design – The work supports the idea that the development strategies of typical products should be considered as a potential local development tool. Besides the enhancing the knowledge of product itself and of its ties with local history and traditions, this could also help promoting a quality tourism in the awareness that local products contribute to the implementation of a multiplicity of local initiatives (such as tourist paths, markets, educational initiatives, community events) able to encourage and support new social relations. Metodology – At a methodological level, the paper developed a theoretical contextualization of the subject of study in the gastronomic tourism and compared, using the technique of benchmarking, the experiences of extra virgin olive oil enhancement and promotion in Italy and Spain. These two countries were selected for this study since they are the main producers in the world of olive oil with certified quality. Approach – The interpretative approach has characterized the development of this study; theoretical elaboration and empirical research in fact are processed in parallel. Finding – The research work has demonstrated that the enhancement of extra virgin olive oil is a great potential for the development of new tourism practices such as gastronomic tourism. Originality of research – The work represents a first effort to compare the development and promotion strategies of extra virgin olive oil in Italy and Spain and to examine the possible links with local tourism development.