Developing a mixed-methods framework for sustainable tourism projects evaluation in the small towns of the Indian Himalayan Region

In recent years, the travel and tourism industry in the Kumaon Himalayan region has grown rapidly. The region’s ecologically sensitive geography requires a context-sensitive approach to sustainable tourism development. Most new tourism projects in the region face performance challenges due to delays, scope creep, and other issues. Kumaon represents sensitive mountainous urban areas worldwide. Most previous responses to this problem have been short-term, such as seasonal regulations or strict policies. There is a need to evaluate project performance parameters and raise awareness of sustainable tourism and an inclusive development approach among project stakeholders in the small towns of the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR). This study evaluates the existing literature from 186 sources to determine critical performance assessment indicators. Ten key performance parameters were identified as a weighted aggregate based on their frequency in the literature. A field survey was conducted to assess the implementation of the identified high-impact performance indicators for sustainable and inclusive tourism project development in the IHR. A structured statistical analysis of the data was conducted, based on estimates of the mean, the Friedman test, Spearman’s rank-order correlation, and regression, indicating the gaps between the literature and the implementation of project performance parameters. As an exploratory study in an under-researched context, its contribution is a structured, transferable evaluation framework and a prioritized research agenda rather than a predictive model of development impact. The research proposes a comprehensive framework suggesting strategies to bridge these gaps through hill-tourism-specific sustainable initiatives by capacity building among the project stakeholders.