ASSESSMENT OF TOURISM POTENTIALS OF GURARA AND MAYANKA WATERFALLS IN NIGER STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

Tourist attractions in Gurara and Mayanka Waterfalls in Niger State are largely undeveloped as there is barely any onsite accommodation. Ultimately this negatively influences tourism as tourists are forced to limit their stay. Therefore, this study assessed the tourism potentials of Gurara and Mayanka waterfalls in Niger State, Nigeria. The primary sources of data used in this thesis include questionnaire administration, oral interview and reconnaissance survey. The secondary data are those data that have been used by previous researchers, as well as Niger State Government documents on tourism of the study areas. These were used to achieve the stated objectives. The methods of data analysis include frequency percentage, statistical mean and fourpoint rating scale. The result revealed that Gurara waterfall attracts both indigenes and nonindigenes while Mayanka waterfalls attracts indigenes as perceived by the respondents. Strongly agreed ranked highest with 164 respondents, while no respondent disagreed or strongly disagreed in Gurara waterfalls. In Mayanka waterfall, disagreed ranked highest with 64 respondents and strongly disagreed ranked the least with 42 respondents. The result also shows that 189 respondents strongly agree that their exist tourism master plan for Gurara waterfall, 116 respondents strongly disagree for tourism master plan for Mayanka waterfall. This implies that only Gurara waterfall has tourism master plan but the implementation of the master plan was very low. The possible constraints of tourism in the study areas include lack of strategic marketing, lack of promotional programmes, and lack of proposed event product development; like festivals. Lack of strategic marketing ranked highest with 130 respondents and lack of promotional programmes ranked least with 80 respondents. This implies that the major possible constraint was lack of strategic marketing for the tourism sites. It’s therefore recommended that that tourism could flourish at Gurara and Mayanka Waterfalls in Niger State through proper cooperation and co-ordination of the key players which include tourism investors, Niger State Government, Host Communities and Local Government Authority