Health Tourism Contribution to the Structural Dynamics of the Territorial Systems with Tourism Functionality

The study aims to identify the role of health tourism (SPA) in developing the territorial systems, characterized by the tourism functionality, in Romania, for the period 2000-2012, a period marked by spectacular transformations, especially for this economic sector. Tourism has now become a true economic engine, generating an increase in the functional complexity of the territorial system, which is based on exploiting tourism resources. To quantify how tourism has contributed to the economic development of these territorial systems in Romania a database of NACE codes was set up, specific for the tourism activity, for the period 2000-2012, for territorial mainframe systems with functionality resort. Based on this statistical support analyzes on the evolution of the number of companies, number of employees, turnover and profit were made. The results show the important role of health tourism in generating multiplier effects on other components of the economic subsystem. They were defined two categories of territorial systems: territorial systems where tourism plays a complementary role function and territorial systems in which health tourism has a preeminent role in the local economy.