Tourism and Cultural Heritage: Sector Priorities of Regional Development Policy within Bucharest-Ilfov Region

The sustainable development gets a great importance in the context of Romania integration in the EU and globalization, a context in which the intersection of the economic, social environmental but also cultural and recreational sector is more and more complex. Having in mind this complex context, in this paper, we present a personal point of view regarding the potential for growth in tourism of Bucharest-Ilfov region, due to vast range of tourist offer (cultural, business, recreational). The Bucharest-Ilfov region has a great tourism potential: the attraction capacity of the Bucharest urban centre is enriched by the environmental and cultural value of the areas and sites surrounding the capital city. This combination of urban, business, cultural and environmental resources is a powerful basis for developing the tourism sector in the region. The tourism sector must be a priority of the regional development policy, because of the importance of the tourism contribution to growth and job creation so the infrastructure improvement is therefore a necessity for tourism development. In line with the above, the main goal of this paper is to demonstrate the necessity of increasing the economic importance of the tourism sector within the regional economy.