Can culinary tourism play an important role in helping create sustainable development in some of the countries along the ancient silk road? A new report recently released by the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) says that might be the case, suggesting that a growing demand for "experience based" tourism could open the door for countries to earn tourists' dollars by promoting their gastronomy.
The report, though plagued by poorly written language that often reads like it was taken from a tourism ministry brochure, does offer some interesting insights into how countries in Central Asia (and other parts of the world) are trying to capitalize on their culinary traditions, even if those traditions include, as in Kazakhstan's case, the consumption of horse meat.
