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The theme of the second worbhop “Growth Strategies” caused a rich discussion among the participants on the factors influencing tourism development and consequently determining successful growth strategies. The subject of discussion was illustrated with the presentation of the cases of Switzerland (Thomas Bieger etal.), Austria (Franz Hartl and Ivanka Avelini‐Holjevac) and Finland (Seppo Aho). All reports outlined the structural problems that the tourism sector is facing due to an insufficient productivity and a lack of resources, among others. The participants of the workshop unanimously agreed that there was no future existing for some of the Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SM Es), particularly in developed countries.

The paper is focused on the sports tourism offer giving the example of Croatia. Emphasis is placed on the quality of the sports tourism offer — that considered being the key of success on the tourism market. The aim of the paper is to stress the need for developing sports tourism offer required by the tourists of today. Sport is a part of the health tourism offer. Health, recreation, sport, fitness, beauty and leisure time are the elements of the quality of life. Sport is not adequately represented in the Croatian tourism offer. This paper suggests measures that need to be taken in order to increase the share of sports in the tourism offer. Such measures should lead to aligning the supply with the demand, and to increasing financial effects. Tourism plays a very important role in the economic development of Croatia, and it deserves high priority in the development strategy.

The authors are convinced that SME hotels could take the lead in the ongoing transition process of Croatia's hotel industry. They comment the instruments which should be used for stimulating the structural change.

Until now the majority of researchers of sports tourism have focused their research on the tourist and their characteristics, meaning, on the demand. Since the majority of authors (Gibson 1998; Seddighi and Theoracharous 2002; Hudson 2003; ?inch and Higham 2001) studied tourists and their characteristics we decided to focus on the providers of active sports holidays. According to Planina, Mihali_(2002, pg. 29) the tourism model is built on demand and supply. The supply side was analyzed by WTO (2004) in their research amongst European tour operators with the highest turnover in order to establish how sport features in products involving Latin America. Based on this idea we decided to carry out a research amongst providers of active sports holidays and asked them about a typical client. We divided the providers into segments according to the type of guests. The research was carried out to find the answer to the question “What do providers of active sports holidays offer in Slovenia and how they perceive their guests?” We were interested to know what they actually offer and the trend of the enquiries they receive from their visitors. The characteristics of the visitors are important to help providers decide how to develop their facilities to meet the demands of the market. We learnt that in Slovenia the majority of tourists are short‐length stays. We also researched the supply and demand and learnt that the providers expect the demand to be highest for skiing and cycling. In the largest of the segments the activities most frequently offered are swimming (water sports), tennis (racquet sports), the usual team sports and skiing. However, the demand for these sports is not growing. Amongst the activities which are in lesser demand but have been defined by the providers as growing are mountain biking and golf.

The 47th Congress attempted to answer the following key questions: What exactly does quality mean in tourism? How can general and/or total quality be produced and marketed? How important is it to include the customer (tourist) in the process that leads to the provision of tourism services? In what way does quality create competitive advantages? How can the quality of a destination be assured in the same way as that of a corporation?

Questions à traiter. Le 47e congrès de l'AIEST s'est engagé à analyser les questions de fond suivantes:

Fragestellungen. Der 47. AIEST‐Kongress hat sich bemüht, folgenden Grundsatzfragen nachzugehen: