Guidelines for the Creative Economy: Enhancing the Value of Cultural and Natural Resources in the Peripheral City, Chanthaburi Province of Thailand

Abstract

The purposes of this study were to: 1) study the value of cultural and natural resources which were the tourism places of Chanthaburi province, 2) understand the relationship between the application of creative economy in the peripheral city and the tourists’ experiences which were derived by the collaboration (Quadruple Helix) and co-creation of value, and 3) study the comparative case study of the application of creative economy in other cities such as Sawankhalok district, Sukhothai province and Khon Kaen Province from which were benefited from the application of collaboration (Quadruple Helix) and co-creation of value. The research method was the combination method between quantitative and qualitative approaches. The research instruments were the questionnaire which was tested for the scores of ‘reliability’ and Index of Item-Objective Congruence (IOC) by 3 experts. The interview questions were made in the semi-structure. The samples of study were 590 visitors who visited at the cultural and natural tourism places of Chanthaburi province and 20 key informants. Statistics used in quantitative data analysis were mean, cross-tab analysis, and correlation analysis. For the qualitative approach, the descriptive analysis was applied.

The findings disclosed as follows: 1) the cultural and natural resources of Chanthaburi were abundant and various; 2) the tourists’ experience and the application of creative economy model had a significant positive relationship; 3) the guidelines for creative economy enhancing the value of cultural and natural resources in the peripheral city were the collaboration (Quadruple Helix) and co-creation of value; and 4) the local universities played key roles in supporting such collaboration and co-creation of value.

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