Tourism Policy and Planning in Bangladesh

This book accounts that Bangladesh is a potential destination in South Asia exhibiting a steady growth in its economy along with socio-cultural developments. With a population of over 170 million, the country possesses significant possibilities in (domestic) tourism. This book explicates that increasing number of upper social classes along with their affordability to spend on tourism and leisure activities has recalled attention for the development of this emerging industry.

This book comprehensively examines the overall tourism and hospitality contexts in Bangladesh under the lens of current policy and administrative frameworks. In so doing, the contribution of tourism and hospitality industry has been highlighted in the economy of Bangladesh as a means to creating employment opportunities. Further, the book addresses that contributions remain uneven and distributed improperly and to date the tourism industry has not been offered the desired attention in supporting examples in this regard. Nonetheless, tourism and hospitality education and research have been intensifying in recent years across numerous higher academic institutions (e.g. public and private universities) in Bangladesh. This book explores critically the requirement of supportive roles of key tourism and hospitality stakeholders both from public and private domains. Ultimately, the book signifies collaborative and continuous efforts are imperative that partake both the practitioners and the academia in the development and execution of inclusive and functional tourism policy and planning in Bangladesh.

Dr Muhammad Shoeb-Ur-Rahman is an Assistant Professor of Tourism and Hospitality Management at University of Dhaka, Bangladesh. He holds a PhD in Tourism Management from Lincoln University, New Zealand and MBA in Tourism and Hospitality Management from University of Dhaka. His research interests include sustainable tourism, tourism management, tourism planning and policies, tourism governance, crisis and resilience in tourism systems, and destination development. Dr Rahman has presented his papers in reputed international tourism conferences and published 13 refereed papers and two book chapters until now. A couple of his notable works concentrating on community governance approach for sustainable tourism development in a developing country context and immediate responses to a global pandemic by the hospitality industry of Bangladesh are under review process in top-tier tourism journals. He is a regular reviewer of a few academic journals including Tourism Review International, which is an ABDC ranked journal.

Dr Azizul Hassan is a member of the Tourism Consultants Network of the UK Tourism Society. Hassan’s areas of research interest are: technology-supported marketing for tourism and hospitality, immersive technology application in the tourism and hospitality industry, technology influenced marketing suggestions for sustainable tourism and hospitality industry in developing countries. Hassan authored over 100 articles and book chapters in leading tourism outlets. He is also part of the editorial team of 15 book projects from Routledge, Springer, CAB International and Emerald Group Publishing Limited. Hassan is a regular reviewer of Tourism Management, Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, Tourism Analysis, the International Journal of Human Resource Management, Journal of Ecotourism, Journal of Business Research, eReview of Tourism Research (eRTR), International Interdisciplinary Business-Economics Advancement Journal, International Journal of Tourism Cities, Heliyon and Technology in Society.