As Rector of the University of Parma, I am very pleased to offer my best wishes to this new international magazine, which addresses an important sector like tourism from different points of view, with a particular focus on its legislative aspects. I am even more pleased considering the long and illustrious tradition of our University in the study of law. The “International Journal of Tourism, Travel and Hospitality Law” aims to become a platform for dialogue among specialists in tourism law: a place for discussion and for proposals for an industry that requires clarity and specific rules. I underline this coming from a country where tourism is one of the most fundamental assets, fully aware of the crucial role of the sector (and its considerable further potential) in the community market. Following the dark period caused by the pandemic, travel has now greatly recovered and the trend does not appear to be temporary. In order to support recovery and regulate the tourism sector, policy action will need to guarantee legislative uniformity: a necessary requisite to develop the industry’s future. It is necessary to fill the existing regulatory gaps (which became apparent recently, for example, in the years of the Covid-19 health emergency) and to have rules that are not only certain but also shared (the theme of sharing is particularly important for such a complex reality), to ensure that a rapidly and continuously transforming sector can keep up with changing times, changing society, changes in the consumer. Like many other areas, tourism has also “changed its skin” in recent years and continues to do so. The modes of travel and traveling are very different from even just a few years ago, and the same can be said for access to travel, its promotion, its sale/purchase, its use, the relationship between operators and travellers and much more. This is why it is essential that the legislative framework keeps pace, to adequately protect both consumers and operators and to accompany the evolution of the sector in the most appropriate way.
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