Tourism destination image on the growth of tourism industry in Uganda:

Abstract

The study was about destination image and tourism growth and development in Uganda. The study was aimed at achieving the following objectives; to examine the impact of destination cognitive image on the growth of tourism industry in Uganda, to examine the impact of tourist activities factors on the growth of tourism industry in Uganda, to examine the impact of infrastructural factors to the growth and development of tourism industry in Uganda. The study discovered that despite the importance of destination image on tourism sector very few papers have tried to explore the relationship of destination image on tourism growth and development in Uganda. This creates the question of what is the impact of destination image on tourism growth and development in Uganda economy. 36 respondents were selected to give their views about destination images and tourism growth in Uganda and closed-ended questionnaire was the main tool used to collect the responses from the different respondents. We used cross sectional research design and a quantitative approach. Findings showed that there is a very significant impact between destination image and tourism growth and development; cognitive image and tourism growth; and infrastructure factors and tourism growth. The study therefore recommends that improvement of tourism growth requires a good destination image having facilities, cognitive image for instance the tourist attractions, accommodation and infrastructure.