Operations research in tourism: Developing tourist circuits

Operations research (OR) is a science that supports rational decision making. It is an analytical method for decision making and problem solving that is helpful in managing organizations. The OR process consists of: (i) identifying a problem that needs to be solved; (ii) developing a model around the problem resembling a real organization and variables; and (iii) providing a comprehensive and complex solution aimed to minimize the cost, maximize the revenue or optimize the use of resources. OR is an interdisciplinary branch of mathematics that integrates statistics, algorithms and mathematical modelling to arrive at an optimal decision. In tourism and hospitality, OR helps demand forecasting, market segmentation, pricing and revenue management, productivity analysis, crowd management, network and value chain analysis, event scheduling and tourism circuit development. The current case study aims to familiarize the tourism and hospitality students with an OR tool known as the 'travelling salesman problem' (TSP) in creating tourist circuits.