Leveraging Local Value in a Post-Smart Tourism Village to Encourage Sustainable Tourism

Abstract

Post-Smart Tourism Destinations (PSTD) need a sense-of-place approach based on uniqueness and thematic differentiation to deliver authentic and valuable experiences. Information and communication technology (ICT), digital technology adoption, sustainable development, community empowerment and local wisdom, and destination uniqueness are keywords that will be further explored in the development of tourism villages in Kenderan as the most important tourism destination development at the village level. The development of smart tourism, proof of the disruption of digital technology in the tourism sector, has become the objective of almost every tourism destination in the world today, be it an urban or rural area. Since its initial emergence, the smart concept in tourism development has evolved. In the beginning, it focused on ICT and the adoption of digital technology. Along with the pressure of the global requirement to apply sustainable development, the focus of smart tourism later included sustainability in the application of smart technology, which made smart tourism development (STD) become smart and sustainable tourism development (SSTD). The post-smart tourism concept arose because many critics suggested that destinations tend to place too much focus on technology adoption and lack attention to local wisdom, inclusivity, and local indigenous aspects of destination development. Applied research implemented mixed methods in the form of qualitative research through expert judgment and quantitative research through structural equation modeling analysis. The results of this research show that creative events for the local aspects of a tourist village, digital competence, and sustainability practice are the building blocks for a post-smart tourism village, while digital competence and sustainable practice have a significant mediating effect of locality on post-smart tourism villages. To ensure a tourism village possesses sustainable competitive advantages, the village must explore and promote its locality aspects to differentiate itself as a tourist village by identifying its valuable, rare, inimitable, and non-substitutable tourism resources. The implication of this research is that to develop wise and distinctive smart tourism destinations, tourist villages should explore their local values and resources, embed them into their basic components and core resources of tourism, and co-create, distribute, deliver, and promote them to the global market through technology adoption and global sustainability value.