The “bottomless pit” effect – An analysis of tourism development funding in the Ormánság

Abstract

The paper intends to analyse tourism development supports and their regional impacts in the Ormánság since Hungary’s accession to the European Union. According to the authors, in the Ormánság, a strongly disadvantaged region it is very important to receive grants and funding from the EU and from other sources; but not any less significant to measure how these sources were utilised and determine whether any changes have been detected from 2004 on. Our hypothesis is that hardly any positive processes can be experienced in the researched area, neither from social nor from economic aspects. Our paper explores whether claiming that the Ormánság is a “bottomless pit” is true or not.