Challenges and Opportunities in Van Destination’s Opening Up to the Iraqi Tourism Market

Tourism’s competitive nature and dynamics obligating renewal require conducting of local scale studies that would feature destinations’ competitive aspects and attraction elements. This study conducted in Van is of importance in terms of the current situation of tourism markets and problems/opportunities. The main purpose of this study is, through the opinions of the participants, who are on the supply side of the destination, assess Van’s current tourism potential in the eyes of Iraqi citizens with a critical point of view and reveal the impact and change with the knowledge in the field. Qualitative research design has been taken as basis as the research method. In this scope, face to face in-depth interviews were made with a total of 15 persons comprising representatives of public and private institutions and organisations working on Iraqi tourism, officials of civil society organisations, public staff having health tourism experience, officials of transport companies that organise travels from Van to Iraq, officials of travel agencies and accommodation sector in the collection of qualitative data. In the analysis of data, data collected with an interpretative perspective was studied with content analysis. Conclusions reached in this study can be summarised as Van could not unveil and manage its existing tourism potential due to various reasons in recent years; has a serious potential in terms of the tourism market; has the potential to get fast and effective results from the Iraqi tourism market; and planning of direct flights between Iraq and Van as a priority maintains its importance.