Sustainable destination image recovery for enhancing the performance of the tourism sector in Zimbabwe

Abstract

The main aim of this paper was to contribute to the development of a robust destination image (DI) recovery model for enhancing the performance of the tourism sector in Zimbabwe. While the developed world generally enjoys both a strong DI and sound economic performance of the tourism sector, many destinations especially in the developing world desperately require sustainable DI recovery so that they can maximize tourism’s contribution to GDP, employment creation, exports generation, poverty alleviation and the destination’s happiness index. DI is thus an important antecedent of destination performance. In fact, evidence exists to suggest a link between DI and travelers’ purchasing habits. Africa’s image and tourism’s economic performance, like Zimbabwe’s have been negatively affected by disease, the perception of serious corruption, political instability, violent conflicts, underdevelopment, severe droughts, and extreme poverty. These dimensions have contributed to Zimbabwe’s weak DI and poor performance of the tourism sector over the years. A structured and semi-structured questionnaire, as well as a semi-structured interview guide, were used respectively to collect data from international tourists, service providers and key informants in Zimbabwe. Data was collected from various locations from a sample of 311 and NVivo, AMOS and SPSS were used to analyze the data. The study revealed the major causes of the unfavorable DI and poor tourism performance and also proffered turnaround strategies. The implications of the study were that the overall value attached by the tourist to a destination was pivotal, together with the cognitive and affective images, in developing a sustainable model for DI repair which would be instrumental for the enhancement of performance of the tourism sector in Zimbabwe.