SPANISH MARKETING FIRM TO DRAW UP STRATEGY PLAN FOR CRO. TOURISM

PLITVICE LAKES, Nov 4 (Hina) - A renowned Spanish marketing firm will draw up a strategic marketing plan for the development of Croatian tourism in the 2001-2005 period. The plan will exert outstanding influence among investors, as well as set a different price for Croatia's tourist product, Tourism Minister Pave Zupan-Ruskovic said in Plitvice Lakes on Saturday at a Croatian tourism strategy conference. "The material presented to us today shows that the Croatian tourist strategy cannot be a strategy of Croatia, the Ministry of Tourism or the Croatian Board of Tourism, but a strategy of Croatian regions like Dalmatia, Istria, Dubrovnik or Zagreb," the minister said after the Spanish firm THR Barcelona outlined its plans. Nowadays, the market does not buy a country but a tourist region, a destination with a recognisable product, and this is something Croatia has to acknowledge to adapt to tourism of the new age, said Zupan-Ruskovic. The project costs about two million kuna ($225,000), said Niko Bulic, chairman of the Croatian Board of Tourism. He added the tourist regions, towns and destinations should be the ones creating the new image and tourist product, and not umbrella institutions, as seen in Spanish and Greek experience. (hina) ha