Tourism seasonality and potentiality of development in the Como lake area. A first exploratory study

The current growing competition in the tourism market among regions and regional products accentuates the importance of managing and enhancing local resources of each area according to its competitive edge. The Province of Como is facing a strong tourism growth in the last few years. This could be the key to overcome the productivity slowdown which has been characterizing the area of study in the last fifteen years. This paper addresses the need for an understanding of the evolution of international and domestic tourism in the Province of Como. By analyzing data on annual tourist arrivals and presences, we are able to study the relationship between seasonality patterns and the development of the tourism sector. The methodology adopted is based on a regression analysis approach, by using the seasonal adjustment procedure TRAMO-SEATS. The last part of the paper identifies possible paths of development for the Province of Como aimed at reducing seasonality and acting both on the demand and on the capacity.