The principal field techniques may be divided into three areas
(i) Enumeration at the arrival and departure points. (ii) Registration at hotels and other accommodation units. (iii) Sample Surveys.
Enumeration:
Enumeration at the arrival and departure points is an administrative procedure which assists measurements. For example, frontier arrivals may be counted by way of checking passports, visas, disembarkation cards and the like.
The counting in this case is done at the point of entry or exit from the destination. The entry or exit point may be single or multiple depending upon the size and also, the location of a country.
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In the case of large country, the entry and exit points are many and the tourists have a choice of embarkation or disembarkation from any of these, depending upon their convenience and choice. On the other hand in smaller countries and, in particular, the islands there are a limited number of entry and exit points.
This method of enumeration at the point of arrival and departure is an accurate method of obtaining numbers and can also provide information on the length of stay of tourists. By way of linking arrival and departure dates of individual visitors, the information on the length of stay of tourists is arrived at.
Registration:
Registration of tourist at the place of their stay is another method of measurement. Use is made of registration at hotels and other such establishment or even the cashing or traveler’s cheque. The registration forms of hotels and other such accommodation units are the sources of eliciting information from the tourists who fill these forms at the time of registration.
From these registration forms data are reported periodically to a central bureau which in turn supplies this to concerned authorities. This method of measurement, however, requires legal authority and enforcement. Unless it is binding on such establishment to collect such, information, accurate and timely data collection may not be possible.
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The data collected by way of registration at hotels and other such establishment provides a variety of valuable information which includes information on number, length of stay and tourist nights, etc. It may also provide some profile characteristics of tourists such as their places of origin and may be classified by the type of accommodation and area visited Statistics collected by this method are not necessarily entirely accurate.
This method normally covers to varying degree different forms of accommodation provided on payment. It is difficult to extend it to all type of accommodation inkling private homes where tourists often stay.
Special care has also to be taken to avoid double counting of arrivals when tourists change their accommodation at the same destination. Many a times it happens that a tourist, after having registered at a particular hotel, decides to change it for another for reasons of convenience and/or economy.
The above two methods measure the volume of the tourism to a particular country of destination when and where it occurs, for instance, at an airport or at hotel. In contrast to the above two methods of measurement, another important methods is sample surveys. Sample survey of a population is made by means of interviews and use of questionnaires.
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The question arises, of course, as to how one contact and identifies visitors. The contact may be made at the time of arrival of the visitors or subsequently when the traveler returns home after the event. In either case he is asked to complete a detailed questionnaire which elicits the information or details of his participation in tourism during the past period.
When they, and similar information, they may at the same time also provide basis statistics of volume of tourism to particulars destinations, such as regions, in addition to profile and behaviour characteristics of the population in general.
Sample Surveys:
Sample surveys of foreign tourism can be divided into several types according to scope and purpose and also, according to where and when interviews take place. The more comprehensive survey endeavours to include all or most visitors to a country and obtain volume and expenditure data as well as qualitative data about the tourists themselves and about various aspects of their trip.
This survey is carried out at points of arrival and departure or en route. In order to be representative of the total traffic, interviews must be carried out at all major points of arrival and departure of foreign tourists and also, on all or most routes continuously and also throughout the year.
When, on the other hand, it is desired to obtain more detailed information about one part of the traffic, sample survey may be used to cover that particular part only, for example, industrialists or motorists, in which case interview are carried out only with the visitors on business or those arriving and departing by car, which may be restricted to certain times of the year.
Sample surveys may cover separately visitors of particular nationality or countries of origin. In this case interviews may be conducted at points of arrival and departure but, there are sometimes advantages in the survey being undertaken in the country of origin rather than the country visited.
The biggest advantage in this is that interviews can be conducted in the visitor’s own language. Since, only a small proportion of the total population in a particular country have visited the country studied as a destination, it is necessary to locate them in the first instance.
This can be done, for example, by including question in an omnibus survey in the country of origin, from which names and addresses of past visitors provide the contacts for interviews. The sample survey method is independent of the administrative process and has the advantage of making contact with the tourists from whom all kinds of information relevant to the industry may be elicited.
Statistics have become the essential basis of any policy for the promotion of international tourism. It is also acknowledged today that the lack of statistical data effective methods for their collection, processing and presentation are factors which hamper decision on tourism development in the countries of various regions.
Statistical information is likewise recognised as a vital factor in the rational planning of tourism development and in evaluating progress made towards achieving both national and regional objectives set for tourism development and promotion.
Several countries have development statistics of international tourism to meet their need for measurement of the volume and value of tourism. These countries use methods which have been earlier derived from immigration and exchange control system. In recent years, however, increasing efforts have been made to produce, on the one hand more specific statistics and on the other, to achieve a greater measure of comparability between statistics produced by individuals countries.
It is not possible to obtain adequate information by way of indirect methods derived from administrative system as the volume of international travel has grown tremendously. Direct methods based on sample surveys of tourists are increasingly used, in addition to and in places of indirect methods with a view to obtaining adequate information.
2. for planning and development of physical facilities and for infrastructural requirements. It is not merely that statistics are useful to know the number of tourist arrivals for a series of consequent years to show whether tourist trade in any particular country is growing, stagnant or declining; it is important to know the other attributes like the mode of arrival, the kind of accommodation used, the amenities desired by the traveler, the length of stay, the amount that he spends, the purchases he makes, etc. All this information is essential for tourism planning.
3. For marketing and promotion, it is very essential to know the profile of tourists, both actual and potential. It is only after ascertaining the physiological, psychological, sociological wants of visitors that an effective marketing campaign can be launched.
4. for understanding changes in tourist fashion. Regular returns of statistics help the countries to find out about the flow of the tourist traffic to various destinations. The flow will indicate whether a tourist patronises a beach holiday, winter resort, archaeological site or any other area.
For legislative and administrative purposes since legislation may apply to certain activities alone and not to others.
Limitations of Field Techniques:
1,. It is possible to use tourist actions as methods for measuring international tourism, i.e. by enumerating arrivals at frontiers, by recording currency transactions and by recording the number of nights in various types of accommodation units by the foreign visitors. None of these methods is, however, fool proof.
Each method has its limitations in respect of recording and enumerating foreign visitors. Counting foreign visitors arrivals is the most usual and most widely adopted method.
2. The tourist statistics is basically concerned with arrivals and departures and more particularly with the former. In arriving at these figures, it is, as indicated above, concerned with events rather than individuals and as far as these are concerned, half a dozen visits by same person is counted as six separate events of six tourist arrivals.
3. There are certain difficulties in the matter of counting. The main difficulty is, perhaps, the risk of double counting. Absolute figures of tourists visiting almost every country tend to be inflated because of double counting. For example, an Italian tourist on his way to holiday in Spain travel by car for two days through France and on his return journey to Italy will also travel Know days through France, hence his journey, i.e. his arrival in France is recorded twice.
4. Another problem of statistical measurement in tourism arises from the difficulty of differentiating between tourists and other travellers and between them and the resident and working populations. In their movements and in their stay at various places at destinations it becomes difficult at times to distinguish between them and the residence and the working populations.
5. Also regarding the use of transport to destinations, tourists may use public transport or use their own private transport. They normally enter various destinations without stopping and often without registering their arrival. They do so increasingly even when crossing many national frontiers.
At the destination the tourists use a variety of accommodation ranging from hotels apartments, guest houses and friends’. They eat in the same eating establishment and buy items for use and other services from the same sources from which these are bought by those who are not tourists.