ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the role of culture in the society and secondly draws links between rural development and gastronomic tourism. Heritage is a social, economic, and cultural resource. The specific nature of cultural heritage as a collective good also implies that the investment and maintenance costs have to be covered by all citizens. It is this culture and heritage that are often well preserved between generations in rural areas, and it is in periods of economic decline that their residents seem to cling more to a distinct heritage. In Hungary the new trend of rural development is the mobilizing the use of local cultural and human resources, as well as the traditional material factors generally considered. Gastronomic culture plays an important role in the conception of a cultural economy and rural development. The process of globalization has given rise to the interest in, and focus on, regional identities and the roots of our culture.
