Does food besides tourism core products contribute to Sabah destination image? - Theory and Practice in Hospitality and Tourism Research - page 483

Does food besides tourism core products contribute to Sabah
destination image?

M.Z.N. Adilah, M.S.M. Zahari & A. Emaria
Faculty of Hotel and Tourism Management, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, Malaysia

ABSTRACT: The tourism core products either natural or artificial resources are found to have strong
influenced on the image of a tourism destination. However, there is still unclear understanding of how
and to what extent the local food of particular tourism destination besides it tourism core products con-
tribute to a tourism destination image. This paper conceptually discusses the contribution of local food
in addition to tourism core products toward destination image from a general perspective to the specific
issue related to state of Sabah, Malaysia.

Keywords : Food, tourism core products, Sabah, destination image

1 INTRODUCTION

to predict tourists' behavior and intentions. The
clear example can be looked at the Eiffel Tower in
France whereby the tower itself has long been the
image of this country.
The second factors are the outcome emerging of
two major aspects or image dimensions which are
perceptual and cognitive and affective. In percep-
tual and cognitive image, tourists evaluate the des-
tination resources, its attractions and judging them
based on the value perceived and the importance
of it to them. The higher value of the destination
to them the higher chance for them to visit the des-
tination (Beerli & Martin, 2004). In this context
besides others, Kenya as a country is able to attract
a substantial number of international tourists and
continuously develop its image owing to its vast
tourism resources, especially the unique wildlife
safari plus pristine tropical beaches, culture attrac-
tion and pleasant climate and most of the inter-
national tourists felt those resources are important
and benefits they (Akama & Kieti, 2007).
Affective in other words indicates the emotions
and feeling experienced by tourists at the destina-
tions. The tourist emotions and feeling are normally
influenced by their personal touch or emotional
components that a destination could offer and
attract them (Beerli & Martin, 2004). In this per-
spective, Spain is one of the countries that develop
the destination image from the personal touch and
emotional components. High values of caring,
good hospitality, human kindness, safety, freedom
and friendliness of its peoples become the strengths
of Spain's as a tourism destination (Pot, 2005).
In short, Page and Connel (2006) stated that
resources either natural like wildlife, beaches,

Besides psychological factor like perceptions,
beliefs, learning, attitudes and social factor like
leisure, family, disposal income, and status that
inspire or influence tourists choose a destina-
tion; the impression or image of a destination
itself cannot be ignored. The ability of a country
to develop and maintain their destination image
not only become a fundamental of attracting but
determines the success or sustainability of a des-
tination among the international tourists (Laws,
Scott & Parfitt, 2002). A destination with a good
and positive image will have a better success rate
of being chosen as a tourist destination com-
pared to a destination with negative image (Beerli
& Mart ´ n, 2004). In this context, although there
are many interpretations, a general term of the
destination image is referred to individual percep-
tion or impression regarding particular place and
emotional describes and portray of the destination
(Ibrahim & Gill, 2005) with the other definitions
are highlighted in the literature section.
There are two factors that influence how an
image is developed for a respective tourist destina-
tion as delineated in the Tourism Marketing frame-
works (Lin, Morais, Kerstetter & Hou, 2007). The
first factor relates to person emotionality and
rationality. This is occurring when tourists give or
perceive a major importance to the image of tour-
ism destination and ultimately influence their final
choice or behavioral intention. Bigne, Sanchez and
Sanchez (2001) contended that tourism destina-
tion assessment can assist tourism management
to identify strengths and weaknesses in turn able