The Prospects of Domestic Tourism in Post-Covid Nepal: Connecting the Missing Dots

Abstract

Nepal has experienced challenges in developing its international tourism business during Covid-19 and domestic tourism has not yet been considered a viable alternative to the allure of foreign travel in Nepal. There are no statistics on domestic tourism in Nepal. Worldwide, domestic tourism has been sought as an alternative to revive the tourism industry during a pandemic, and the Ministry of Tourism and Nepal Tourism Board is implementing strategies and plans to promote domestic tourism in Nepal.
 This study aims to investigate the potential of domestic tourism in Nepal from the perspective of domestic tourists. The study is qualitative in nature and has used an online survey from May to June 2020. Data has been analyzed thematically using SPSS, MS-Excel, and descriptive statistics. This study attempts to connect the dots by focusing on domestic tourism and tourist destinations in Nepal in accordance with respondents’ opinions. The findings reveal that the tourism industry can potentially be revitalized by domestic tourism. A high percentage of respondents indicated that the Covid lockdown has floored the tourism sector however, they are highly motivated to travel domestically rather than overseas despite the travel restrictions. To summarize, the potentiality of domestic tourism to strengthen the tourism industry should be further explored, and the absence of strategies and policies, travel restrictions, lack of provision of tourism infrastructure, and safety protocol are barriers to the flourishment of domestic tourism.

From Pre-Pandemic to Post-Pandemic Struggles to Meet Sustainable Development Goals

“…These results are attributed mainly to domestic tourism. In Nepal, domestic tourism is not valued as much as international tourism, resulting in a lack of statistics related to domestic tourism (Silwal et al, 2022). Without proper documentation of domestic tourism statistics, it is not feasible to formulate a sustainable domestic tourism plan to foster this market segment.…”

“…Without proper documentation of domestic tourism statistics, it is not feasible to formulate a sustainable domestic tourism plan to foster this market segment. Further, Silwal et al (2022) suggest that domestic tourism has great potential for Nepal, but it lacks strategies and policies to support domestic tourism. One potential strategy would be to value domestic tourism and capture its potential to address SDGs.…”

“…The author found that domestic tourists were 80-90% of the entire tourism market and had the potential for addressing different SDGs, but a lack of marketing as a major challenge was also identified. As Silwal et al (2022) suggested, better strategies and policies are required to boost the domestic tourism market to niche tourism segments like homestay tourism.…”

Analyzing the Evolution of Nepal's Tourism in 2022: Insights and Future Perspectives

“…Furthermore, the potential of domestic tourism was increasingly considered as a viable alternative to international travel. The absence of robust strategies and policies, alongside travel restrictions and lack of tourism infrastructure, were identified as key barriers to the development of domestic tourism (Silwal et al, 2022).…”