Food and Religion in Sicily—A New Green Tourist Destination by an Ancient Route from the Past

Claudio Bellia, Valeria Scavone and Marzia Ingrassia
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Claudio Bellia: Department of Agricultural, Food and Environment (Di3A), University of Catania, 95126 Catania, Italy
Valeria Scavone: Department of Architecture (DARCH), University of Palermo, 90133 Palermo, Italy
Marzia Ingrassia: Department of Agricultural, Food and Forest Sciences (SAAF), University of Palermo, 90133 Palermo, Italy

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 12, 1-22

Abstract: The Francigena Way ( Via Francigena ) is a long international itinerary that was awarded recognition as a Culture Route of the Council of Europe. It starts in Canterbury (UK), touches 13 European regions and ends in Rome. An ancient track of this route is in Sicily (Southern Italy), and its name is Magna Via Francigena ( Great Francigena Way ). This track is a pilgrimage route that connects two ancient port cities, Palermo and Agrigento, passing through internal rural territories that now deal with the exodus of population from rural to urban areas. The route passes through the Sicilian territory named “Upper-Belìce corleonese”, a rural area around the city of Corleone (a little village known worldwide for the sad Mafia events) that includes a number of municipalities. In the past, this religious pilgrimage was a fundamental part of the expression of faith for Christians and now still represents for Sicilians a strong symbol of Christian identity. In recent decades, pilgrimage tourism around the world has grown significantly each year. The aim of the study is to know the pilgrims’ motivations for choosing the Magna Via Francigena pilgrimage as a vacation and any possible similarities between pilgrimage tourism and food and wine tourism, in the wider context of sustainable and slow tourism. The Policy Delphi method was applied to collect the opinions of the stakeholders involved. The study highlighted the strong link between religious motivations and local enogastronomy, culture, art and nature. Results will support policy-making in the development of integrated territorial tourist marketing strategies.

Keywords: pilgrimage tourism; rural tourism; food and wine tourism; green tourism; integrated territorial marketing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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