The Economic Significance of Tourism in The Gambia

When considering the economic impact tourism has on the poor of Gambian society, the overall influence that tourism has on the Gambian economy must be taken into account. Tourism plays a significant part in Gambia's economy providing employment for 5000 people directly and 6000 of the population indirectly. It also contributes to 30% of export earnings making with it the largest service export (WTO 2006).

The tourism market has changed radically over the years with travellers now looking for different types of experiences. Research carried out by (Cohen 1972) categorised travellers into different groups, one being the institutionalised organized traveller who usually are package holiday makers in search of familiarity at their destination, this group also includes the individual mass tourist who arranges their own trips to increasingly well known destinations.

The other group is the non-institutionalised traveller who are usually adventurers looking for new travel experiences. These groups, especially the non-institutionalised traveller have allowed the tourism industry to diversify and has provided opportunities for LDC's to gain access to this market place.

The (WTO 2006) emphasises the importance that tourism now has on LDC's by claiming that it is often the primary export sector of these countries and generates up to 80% their export earnings. In considering the Gambia in this context you can see from the statistics supplied by The World Tourism Organisation that The Gambia reveals a heavy reliance on tourism, even with comparatively low arrival numbers to other LDC's examined.

Tourism and Local Agricultural Produce Links

As emphasised previously, agriculture is one of foundations that the Gambian economy is built on, representing 30% of the countries GDP and employing 70% of the countries workforce (Mitchell and Faal 2006). Developing links between local producers and buyers for tourist institutions such as restaurants and hotels can play a pivotal role in producing economic benefits for the poor, a fact supported by the Gambian Tourism Value Chain through it analysis of pro-poor benefits from food and beverages.

Some of the issues that have been identified as a barrier in building links between tourism and the agricultural sector were that local suppliers were unable to meet the demand nor produce the quality to satisfy the tourist market. This concern was voiced by Juegen Odenwald, the general manager of the Senegambia Hotel who whilst being interviewed stated that local suppliers could not meet either of these criteria, in stating this he also made the point with some clarity that his business model demands that 'cost is king' and that he wasn't really interested where purchased his produce as long as it was good value, of reasonable quality and was readily available.

When interviewing the manager of the locally owned Chossan restaurant, he declared that he did make a conscious effort to use local produce, but yet again local suppliers were not always able to meet his demand, which resulted in him sourcing some of his produce from Senegal. This issue of supply is highlighted by (Lea 1998) who suggests that the supply of produce often fails to meet demand of the tourism industry resulting in a dependence on imported food which intern increases 'leakages' out of the destination country.

One positive aspect for local food suppliers was that both of these individuals did state that all of their fish was supplied directly from local markets such as Tanje where good links had been established.

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