The strategic role of tourism sector and its considerable contribution to economic development, employment, social and environmental sustainability is acknowledged by all decision-making bodies, from world wide tourism associations (World Tourism Organization – WTO) to national, regional and local communities. The current article analyses the direct contribution of European structural funds on the development of tourism infrastructure in South West Oltenia, one of the development regions of Romania, over the past 15 years. The data used for the research covers the pre-accession funds allocation (SAPARD Programme), the investments in tourism infrastructure from 2007–2013 financial programming framework as well as the current 2014–2020 programming framework – selected projects. The main conclusion that emerges form the research is that European structural funds had greatly contributed to the development of rural tourism infrastructure both in terms of quantity as well as in quality.