Local Communities’ Attitudes and Engagement towards Sustainable Tourism Development in Protected Area: Evidence from Bale Mountains National Park, Dinsho Woreda
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Date
2022-11
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
The main aim of this study was to study the attitude and engagement of local communities towards sustainable tourism development. The study conducted in Bale Mountains National Park (BMNP) in Dinsho woreda of Bale zone south eastern Ethiopia. Descriptive and explanatory research designs with quantitative and qualitative research method were used. The survey questionnaire was designed for local communities and key informant interviews were conducted for tourism stakeholders while in-depth interview for local communities. Both probability and non-probability sampling methods were used to collect data from respondents. Simple random sampling was used to distribute survey questionnaires to local communities and purposive sampling was used for interviewee / tourism stakeholders and local communities in key informant and in-depth interview respectively. The interviewees were selected based on their knowledge and occupation. The data were collected through using both primary and secondary data sources. The quantitative data was analyzed through using SPSS version 20 and qualitative data through text narration. The total 358 of respondents were participated in survey part of the study and 10 respondents were participated from tourism stakeholders and local communities were participated for qualitative data collection through key informant and in- depth interviews. The finding of the study showed that the engagements of local communities in tourism sector are still in the infancy stage and local government needs to give more attention to tourism and the sector development. The overall feedback of local communities revealed that, negative attitude towards environmental and economic sustainable tourism development. In addition to this, the awareness of the communities toward sustainable tourism development needs improvement to build a good attitude on resident mind. In the contrary, the local communities have been positive perception towards social-cultural development. The result revealed on study area plenty of constrained, lack of tourism training, lack of infrastructure, lack of diversification of tourism product and service, unwise resource conservation, lack of awareness, lack of digital promotion and technological infrastructures, less attention given to the destination, focusing on single tourism product /attraction/, lack of government support, lack of coordination among stakeholders and government. Hence, the relationship between host communities and government as well as non-government should be improved, infrastructure development must be applied, and promotion of the destination also the other essential activity which should be applied.
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Keywords
Sustainable tourism development, protected area, Community engagement, Community attitude, Tourism Stakeholders, Bale Mountains National Park