International Tourism Demand and its Determinants in Kenya.
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Date
2015-02-26
Authors
Mbui, David Kirimi
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Kenyatta University
Abstract
Tourism is a major contributor to economic growth in many countries. In Kenya,
tourism is a significant economic activity contributing greatly to the gross
domestic product, foreign exchange earnings as well as employment. In 2011, the
sector contributed 13.7 percent of Gross Domestic Product, about 18.6 per cent in
foreign exchange earnings while creating close to a million jobs. The country's
long term economic development blue print, the Kenya Vision 2030, has
identified tourism as the sector that will enable the country achieve a double digit
economic growth rate thus propelling the country into a globally competitive and
prosperous nation by the year 2030. Despite efforts in marketing the country abroad
through the Tourism board, the sector remains highly susceptible to
perceived or actual risks associated with travel. For the sector to play its rightful
role in contributing to growth, the factors that affect it ought to be empirically
investigated so that those with negative effects can be addressed for the sector to
achieve its envisaged target. The purpose of this study therefore was to
empirically investigate how various factors influence international tourism
demand in Kenya. The study estimated the demand for Kenya's tourism from UK,
America and Indian tourists using the double-log linear model through
Generalized Least Squares estimation technique. Panel data for the period 1980-
2012 was used for the analysis