Potentials, challenges and economic contributions of tourism resources in the South Achefer district, Ethiopia

This study is aimed at assessing potentials, challenges and the economic contributions of tourism resources in the South Achefer district. A descriptive research design and mixed research approaches were employed. 161 samples were selected from target populations. Purposive and snowball sampling techniques were employed. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 22. Descriptive statistics such as frequency, percentage and mean were computed. Qualitative data were triangulated. The result confirmed that the study area has huge potential resources to develop community-based ecotourism with the cumulative mean values of 1.66. These resources include: Zhbst forest; Zhbst and Klti caves; Ashare waterfalls, varied wildlife species, as well as cultural resources such as ancient churches, festivals, funeral ceremonies and monasteries. There are, however, many challenges to using this potential. These include a lack of infrastructure and poor coordination of stakeholders. In the South Achefer district, the levels of community agreement on the economic contributions of tourism were high with a cumulative mean value of 1.7. The potential tourism resources of the area need to be promoted by the tourist office using a variety of promotional tools. To develop these potential tourism resources, concerned bodies must collaborate to provide basic tourism infrastructure facilities and services.