Assessment of Geo-Spatial Tourism Facilities on Sustainable Development in Jos North Local Government Area of Plateau State

Abstract

The study assessed Geo-spatial tourism facilities on sustainable development in Jos North Local Government Area. Specific objectives are to generate maps of public and private tourism facilities and to assess the location and the spatial distribution of the tourism facilities, determine the pattern of tourism distribution in the study area, model the accessibility to tourism facilities, and identify a suitable location of tourism facilities in the near future. This was carried out through the use of GIS to show the pattern of distribution of tourism facilities. A total of 30 tourism sites were considered at random. This includes accommodation, lakes, museums, parks and gardens. The finding reveals, spatial distribution of the tourism facilities on the plateau, the ownership of the tourism facilities and the pattern of distribution of the tourism facilities, that basically means they are mostly clustered, that they are owned by the government and the private sector, while the government tourism facilities it are 8 in number, that of the private facilities are 22 in number out of the 30. This suggest that government has little or no interest in tourism, while the private see tourism as a profit making ventures, that their pattern of distribution was found to have a spatial agglomeration pattern and an uneven distribution within Jos North Local Government, convention facilities and tourism were closely spatial related, where facilities are scattered over space and linear, where facilities development follow straight line pattern usually along important roads. It is therefore, recommended, that the potentials of GIS as an analytical tool can be utilized to determine and measure access to tourism facilities, that all archived data in the tourism ministry’s be updated, digitized and geo-referenced. That there is urgent need to train more experts in the field of tourism provision in the art of spatial data acquisition and management, this would increase the opportunities to realized the full social and economic potentials of the tourism industry. Sustainable tourism development creates the opportunity for government and all stakeholders in the tourism sector to aim at ensuring long-term prosperity and quality of life for future generation. Sustainable tourism development also creates opportunities to preserve natural and cultural heritages of tourist and local people in ways that address development problem and reduce risks to the environment and ways of life.