RURAL TOURISM IN ROMANIA - A MARKETING PERSPECTIVE

The development of national tourist brand is one of the priorities of the Ministry of Regional Development and Tourism. The project on branding Romania is EU-funded, within the Regional Operational Program (ROP) 2007-2013. Out of the different evaluation point of views - qualitative research in source markets and domestic market, project's team opinions, branding project research on the attractiveness / competitiveness, 6 tourism key product of Romanian tourism have been identified, one of them beeing Countryside &Rural Tourism. The paper aimed to present an analysis of the Countryside and rural tourism from a marketing perspective bearing in mind that, in order to reach the target set by the Romanian National Tourism Development Masterplan 2007-2026, of increasing the number of visitors at 9,7 milion in 2016, a marketing plan will be implemented. The average yearly growth of the arrivals number for the countryside and rural sector for 2011-2015 will be 25%.