| dc.description | Tourism is one of the fastest growing and single largest industries in the world. The
contribution of tourism industry in the global as well as individual perspective is really
amazing. Many countries in the world depend upon tourism as a main source of foreign
exchange earnings. According to the World Tourist Organization (WTO), while 448.5
million tourists moved throughout the world during the year 1991 (Quoted by Davidson,
1994), about 593 million tourist arrivals were recorded during 1996 registering a 4.6%
increase over 1995 (Bhattacharya, 1997) and 32.22 percent growth in five years. The
World Tourism Organization recorded a total number of 763 million international tourist
traffics in 2004 which is 10.58% higher than previous year and earned US$ 623.00 billion
which shows an increase of 18.89% over 2003 (WTO, 2005). Tourism continues to surge
as a world economic force, contributing nearly $5.5 trillion to the world’s economy in
2004 (Wagner, 2005). The increasing trend of tourist arrivals and earnings is continuing.
In 2005, the world tourist arrivals rose to 808 million. The World Tourism 2020 Vision
forecasted that this figure will be 1,006.4 million in 2010 and the same will reach to
1,561.1 million in 2020. This continued growth in tourism business through out the world
is encouraging and nations are becoming more concern to attract more tourists to their
own destinations and trying to promoting this sector as a major source for the economic
development of the nation. | en_US |
