Montenegro’s proposed Law on Tourism and Hospitality attempts to widen tourism regulation beyond the licensing of hotels, agencies and restaurants. Approved by the Government on 18 June 2026, the bill introduces principles covering the quality of life of local communities, protection of intangible heritage, regional diversification, destination resilience and the use of digital technology.
The measure is still best described as a bill pending parliamentary completion. Nevertheless, it signals a change in how Montenegro intends to regulate the sector responsible for much of its investment, employment and foreign-exchange income. The Government’s proposal formally introduces “tourism regions” as integrated areas of resources, infrastructure and services that are planned, managed and promoted together.
That definition addresses an old weakness. Tourists experience destinations, while governments frequently regulate individual establishments. A luxury hotel cannot independently solve traffic congestion, water shortages, waste collection, beach management or a shortage of trained labour. Yet failures in those systems determine the hotel’s reviews, room rates and investment returns.
The proposed tourism-region model recognises that accommodation, transport, infrastructure, cultural assets and local communities form one product. Properly implemented, it could improve coordination between national ministries, municipalities, tourism organisations and private operators.
The commercial implications are particularly important in the north. Montenegro has repeatedly sought to reduce its dependence on the short Adriatic summer and attract investment into mountain, rural, wellness and nature-based tourism. Regional diversification written into law can support that policy, but only if it is reflected in roads, wastewater systems, electricity networks, spatial plans and destination marketing.
Kolašin demonstrates the problem. Substantial hotel and residential investment has expanded the number of beds faster than parts of the municipal infrastructure. Investors can complete a building but cannot privately deliver every road, sewer connection or public service on which its opening depends. A tourism law cannot replace capital works, but it can make destination capacity a more explicit part of planning.
The coast faces the opposite pressure: high concentration, seasonal congestion and tension between visitor volumes and residents’ quality of life. The new principles provide a legal basis for considering those pressures rather than treating higher arrival numbers as an unconditional success.
Private accommodation is another test. Montenegro has a large market of apartments, rooms and holiday homes, some formally registered and some operating at the edge of the tax and tourism systems. Digital booking platforms have made these units internationally marketable while weakening the practical importance of a physical travel agency.
The bill’s support for digital technology should therefore be connected to the Central Tourism Register, guest-registration systems, local tourist taxes and platform data. A modern register could help authorities distinguish a family renting two rooms from a professional operator controlling dozens of apartments. Without that distinction, enforcement either misses large informal businesses or imposes disproportionate requirements on genuine rural households.
The proposal liberalises parts of household and rural-tourism activity by allowing close family members to participate in providing services. That can remove unnecessary formality from small family operations, particularly in areas where rural tourism is intended to create supplementary income. But it should not become a route for commercial accommodation businesses to avoid employment, safety or tax rules.
Tour operators and agencies will also see terminology aligned more closely with company law, including the replacement of the older concept of an agency “exposure office” with a branch. Such technical changes appear minor, but inconsistent corporate and sector terminology often creates problems in licensing, registration and liability.
For major hotel investors, the decisive issue will remain predictability. They need to know whether a site is inside a viable tourism region, whether the planned category and capacity are compatible with spatial documents, who must provide connecting infrastructure and how environmental restrictions affect development.
Environmental protection is not external to tourism policy. Montenegro’s proposed Natura 2000 network, marine-protection measures and national-park rules will influence where resorts, marinas, ski facilities and access roads can be built. The strongest destinations will be those able to monetise protected landscapes without consuming the asset on which their premium depends.
The new law’s language is more sophisticated than a conventional licensing statute. Its success will depend on whether “tourism region” becomes an operational unit with data, infrastructure priorities and accountable management—or remains an attractive definition in legislation while every institution continues planning separately.
