Intangible Heritage, Education and Tourism as a Strategy for the Enhancement of the Value of the Dehesa and the Traditional Shepherd’s Trade

Rebeca Guillén-Peñafiel, Ana María Hernández-Carretero and José Manuel Sánchez-Martín ()
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Rebeca Guillén-Peñafiel: Department of Didactics of Social Sciences, Faculty of Education and Psychology, University of Extremadura, 06006 Badajoz, Spain
Ana María Hernández-Carretero: Department of Didactics of Social Sciences, Faculty of Teacher Training, University of Extremadura, 10004 Cáceres, Spain
José Manuel Sánchez-Martín: Department of Art and Territory Sciences, Faculty of Business, Finance and Tourism, Universidad de Extremadura, 10004 Cáceres, Spain

Sustainability, 2024, vol. 16, issue 24, 1-36

Abstract: The dehesas are one of the most unique and characteristic landscapes of the Extremadura region. Together with their natural values, they are an environment in which trades, knowledge and ways of life rooted in the tradition of rural communities are still developed. However, ancestral knowledge and practices are in danger of disappearing. Faced with this problem, this study is focused on the benefits of tourism, using sustainability criteria to evaluate their ability to educate and to increase awareness and sensitivity of the importance of maintaining this intangible cultural legacy. Based on this premise, the main objective is to determine and analyze tourists’ evaluations of the traditional shepherd’s trade and the educational possibilities of agritourism experiences. For this purpose, a survey was carried out among 102 tourists who visited different cheese dairies in an Extremadura region that offers agritourism experiences. In addition, this work also aims to know the current situation of the shepherd’s trade, identifying the benefits of its conservation and determining the threats that hinder its preservation. It also seeks to determine the solutions that could safeguard it. To this end, the Delphi method was used and 26 experts, mainly shepherds and shearers, were interviewed. The results reveal that tourists can identify the educational and cultural functions associated with pastoralism. They also recognize increased curiosity, empathy and environmental awareness as the main benefits derived from the tourism experience. The interviews reveal the suitability of disseminating the heritage and educational value of the dehesa through sustainable tourism experiences to increase interest in the rural world, revalue ancestral knowledge and contribute to its preservation.

Keywords: dehesa; education; heritage; sustainability; tourism; traditional shepherd’s trade (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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