Developing Domestic Tourism:

A Conceptual Model For Lagos Tourism

ACCORDING to The tourist gaze, anyone taking a moment to view different scenes, landscapes and townscapes or artworks, which are out of the ordinary, is a tourist. The tourist gaze, from a postmodern posture, conceptualises tourism as an engagement and experience rather than a specific form of travel. The implication of this is that ever yone is a tourist much of the time whether he/ she knows about it or not.

Experiences such as annual ethnic or communal festivals celebrated to mark epochs or celebrate the culture and heritage of people, which enable participants to explore what they do not enjoy on a regular basis without leaving their familiar neighborhood are a case in point. This view of tourism embraces the main elements of the traditional definition of tourism with variations in space and time one spends as a tourist in a particular destination. It therefore caters for both international and domestic tourists, whether one engages in overnight stay or a few hour( s) of excursion. Understanding Domestic Tourism:

Tourism, first and foremost, is domestic. It is usually a product of the Eco- system. Domestic tourism is the tourism of residents within the economic territory of the country of reference. Many writers have referred to the term ‘ residents’ in tourism literature with such commonly used terminologies as host, community, local communities, rural communities and hosting communities. In the context of domestic tourism residents are providers of tourism goods and services at destinations and not consumers unto themselves.

Many writers have defined domestic tourism from various perspectives; while a school of thought defines domestic tourism as all trips over 40 kilometres outside one’s usual environment which can be day trips or overnight trips for any given travel purpose; another perceives domestic tourism as the travel by residents of a country within the country, which can be same day or overnight within or outside the same state and territory but excluding travelling for work or school; and lastly another defines domestic tourism simply as tourism within one’s country of residents. Though these definitions inevitably appear diverse one particular element that transcends these definitions is the fact that domestic tourism is characterised basically by movement of tourists from one area of the traveler’s country to the other.

What is more, domestic tourism can be said to embody such approaches in tourism practices as Community Based Tourism ( TBC), Ecotourism ( ET), Pro- poor tourism ( PPT) and sustaining tourism- eliminating poverty ( STEP).