Sustainable tourism and cultural heritage in Zambia

Abstract

The study examined Zambia’s potential in Sustainable Tourism and Cultural Heritage of the Ten (10) natural waterfalls situated in five provinces of Zambia. The study investigated the extent of visitations of these waterfalls annually by international and local tourists. The United Nations World Tourism Organization General Assembly Resolutions guided the study. Sustainable tourism is tourism that takes full cognizance of the current and future economic, social and environmental impacts on visitors, the industry and hosting communities. Cultural Heritage  is an expression of the community’s ways of living developed and passed on from one generation to another through customs, practices and values among others. Methodically, the study was guided by a purposive sampling technique using the descriptive and applied qualitative research techniques whose main objective was description of the state of affairs of the natural waterfalls as they exist currently and arrived at an inductive Ex post facto research for descriptive purposes. The findings indicated minimal visits of the sites mainly by domestic local tourists due to poor infrastructure and underdevelopment of the sites which is below international standards. The findings further highlighted little or no social and economic benefits of the local people due to few cultural heritage activities being done on the sites which has undermined tourism industry.  The researchers, therefore, recommended development of the sites to international standards to make them more attractive to tourists and attainable to national economic tourism sustainability thereby contributing to economic growth and poverty reduction among the local people around these sites.