Stakeholders’ participation and implementation of the National tourism policy in Naivasha Sub County, Kenya

Abstract

The National Tourism Policy is a set of rules, guidelines and objectives which provides a regulatory framework that integrates tourism stakeholders at National and County levels for sustainable tourism development. The Kenyan tourism industry operates within the stipulated policies and regulations for it to remain competitive and sustainable in the global arena. The lack of effective stakeholder participation remains a major obstacle in sustainable tourism policy realization with little clarity how this can be resolved. Moreover, adherence to Tourism Regulatory Authority licensing by stakeholders is very low which questions stakeholder participation, sensitization and education. This study sought to establish stakeholder participation and National Tourism Policy implementation in Naivasha Sub-County. The study objectives were: stakeholder participation decision making, monitoring, evaluation and resource mobilization influence on National Tourism Policy implementation. The study hypothesized that there was no significant influence of decision making, monitoring, evaluation and resource mobilization on National Tourism Policy implementation. The study was grounded on Stakeholder theory and Ladder of Participation theory. Mixed Methods based and concurrent embedded design were used. The study targeted 8749 respondents from Tourism Regulatory Authority, Tourism Fund, star rated hotels, non star rated hotels and campsite, County Tourism and tourists. A sample size of 353 were selected using purposive and probability sampling and simple random sampling techniques. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to collect primary data. Data was collected using questionnaires for managers of star rated, non-star rated hotels and campsites, Tourism Regulatory Authority officers, County Tourism Officer and tourists and interviews schedule were for Tourism Regulatory Authority and Tourism Fund managers. Quantitative data was analyzed through descriptive statistics and inferential statistics while qualitative data was analyzed using thematic analysis. Multiple Regression Analysis tested hypotheses to establish the influence of stakeholder participation on the implementation of NTP. Findings indicated that there was a positive significant influence of decision making (β1=0.215; p-value=0.013), monitoring (β2=0.258; p =0.003), evaluation (β3=0.332; p =0.000) and resource mobilization (β4= .330; p =.000) on NTP implementation. The study concluded that stakeholder participation in decision making, monitoring, evaluation and resource mobilization had a significant influence on NTP implementation in Naivasha Sub County. The study recommends in order to enhance stakeholder participation implementation, the Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife should embrace Bottom up implementation strategy through involving TRA in enforcing, monitoring and NTP implementation. TRA and County should enhance civic education to stakeholders to make them participate and own up to policy decisions higher levels other than manipulative participation. The study recommends that hotels have internal quality monitoring units to enforce standards. It further recommends that the Ministry, TRA and County should develop a collaborative work plan so that stakeholders solve conflicting and duplication of roles