This study is directed at the tourism industry in Nigeria using Abuja City as a focus for revealing the enormous potentialities that remain untapped by succeeding governments in Nigeria and the passive private sector The fact that tourism is now the world's largest industry, it has continued to receive
considerable attention word wide The fact is that Nigeria does not accord the same level of importance to this industry currently Certain problems have been highlighted in this study. They include a very insignificant contribution of about onepercent to the cross domestic product of Nigeria, dearth of tourist facilities, lack of maintenance culture, lack of professional training on the part of operators and lack of a well packaged and elective marketing plan tor the industry over the years among others.
The objectives of the study include amongst several others to develop a sustainable and effective marketing strategy for the tourism industry using Abuja as a pilot to determine the degree of relationship between the gross domestic product of tourism, the level of foreign arrivals and the Gross Domestic Product of the country.
An extensive elaborate literature review is undertaken by the researcher to reveal the current trends of tourism planing and policy development in other areas of the world.
A historical development of tourism in Nigeria is examined to bring to focus the studies Nigeria had undertaken in the past in an effort to develop tourism
An analysis of data generated by administrating questionnaires in the field is undertake to establish certain important current trends A test of hypothesis that the
gross domestic product of Tourism and the number of foreign arrivals in Nigeria have an impact on the Gross Domestic Product of Nigeria is conducted using the
statistical package tor the social sciences
A linear multiple regression model of Y = -156588 + 507 724X, + 0 005985 X2 is
developed and is significant at one percent
The principal reasons for visitors arriving Abuja is fund be attendance of conferences seminar workshops, summits and meeting Most of these visitors are sponsored by their organizations.
Finally a set of recommendations are suggested by the research to assist in realizing the dream that Abuja become a foremost tourist attraction in Africa.
The Study ends with a Summary of Research Finding Recommendation and Conclusion.
