POTENTIAL OF TOURISM DEVELOPMENT TO PRESPA NATIONAL PARK

Research has shown that the Prespa Lakes basin's greatest tourism strengths lie in its nature and heritage and that it has a developing ecotourism product. Facilities to foster nature-based and heritage-based tourism exist but the area is suffering from a lack of profile and declining market interest, and the very important domestic market in each country is increasingly holidaying elsewhere. There have been many tourism- related support initiatives in the area in the past, but their sustainability is mostly questionable. There is a need for projects to be more strongly embedded in local institutions which take responsibility for continuing them. The accommodation base in Albania is weak, with some developments in community-based tourism. Solid waste issues undermine tourism potential in Albania especially. National Parks are the area's strongest tourism asset at present and sustainable tourism capacity is strongest within some of these organizations. Seasonality is a major challenge not only in Albania but in all three countries and products and events have not been developed to address this. There is an expanding tourist information Centre (TIC) network that can be built upon. There is no real trans-boundary tourism on offer at present and there are very few private sector tour operations in the area, although some small activity tour operators are developing actually.