Assessing Niche Tourism Potentials at Kit Mikayi Sacred Site using activity-based segmentation: towards sustainable tourism product diversification.

Abstract

This paper examines the niche tourism potential at Kit Mikayi Tourist Site in Kisumu County. The study analysed core niche tourism practices using the activity-based-segmentation; host communities’ attitudes towards sustainable niche tourism development; potential tourism projects and the socio-economic factors likely to affect tourism development at Kit Mikayi Tourist Site, and proposes ways through which existing and potential challenges can be addressed. The research data was mainly analysed using the content analysis and thematic analysis methods. The study revealed that the site is frequented by individual and organized groups, dominated by domestic visitors. Identified tourists’ activities include: seeing and climbing the Kit Mikayi Rocks, listening to traditional songs and participating in dodo dance, visiting homesteads, taking souvenir photos, and worshiping. Revealed Kit Mikayi site’s potential niches include edutainment, photography, geology, and genealogy and music tourism. Though not unanimous, the local communities support tourism development because of the perceived socio-economic opportunities. Challenges linked to marketing, management, ethnic mistrust and competence inadequacies among the internal actors need to be addressed through partnership approach.

Keywords: Niche tourism, marketing approach, activity-based-segmentation, Kit Mikayi, partnership, cultural tourism.