Rural ecotourism planning and design based on SWOT analysis

Abstract With the increasing pace of urban life, people are yearning more and more for a slow-paced rural life. Rural ecotourism is a new type of tourism produced for people to experience rural scenery. In order to ensure the sustainable development of rural eco-tourism, it is necessary to analyze its planning in many aspects. In this study, Tianjin rural eco-tourism was analyzed using the superiority, weakness, opportunity and threats analysis method. Then, according to the analysis, the superiority, weakness, opportunity and threat were obtained, and they were quantitatively analyzed by means of a questionnaire. The results showed that the development of Tianjin rural eco-tourism had four superiorities, i.e. convenient transportation, rich water resources, rich animal and plant resources and rich eco-tourism resources; three weakness, i.e. homogeneous content, unclear theme and low quality of staff; three opportunities, i.e. government support, effective combination of local culture with tourism activities and increased demand for tourism; and two threats, i.e. fierce competition among peers and diversified demands of tourists. In the comprehensive quantitative analysis, the comprehensive scores of superiorities, weakness, opportunities and threats were 3.6, −2.8, 4.4 and −4.4, respectively. To sum up, Tianjin rural ecotourism has superiorities over weakness and equivalent opportunities and threats; i.e. it is basically in a state of sustainable development.