ECONOMIC IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON THE TOURISM INDUSTRY OF GILGIT REGION

Abstract

This research aims to investigate the Economic impact of COVID-19 on the travel and tourism industry of the Gilgit region. After the outburst of COVID-19 world’s economy especially the tourism industry has been devastated. As a tourism hub of Pakistan, Gilgit was also under the siege of the Covid-19 pandemic resultantly this industry collapsed. For this study researcher’s universe was the Gilgit region, consisting of three Districts Hunza, Nagar, and Gilgit itself. A sample size of 163 respondents was taken from these three different districts with the help of a convenient sampling technique, a type of non-probability sampling technique. Respondents of this study were those who were associated with the travel and tourism industry for a long time and having at least five years of experience, asked specific queries. Cross-sectional research design was used to get data once throughout the research process. A closed-ended questionnaire on a Likert scale was made to get responses from respective respondents. It was concluded from this study that the cost of transportation increases, the number of tourists visiting per day decreases, and when the government imposes unbearable sops as a result the income level of people associated with the tourism industry declines.