Introduction

Throughout history, humans always travelled to different places due to different circumstances, be it for food, trade, leisure or other purposes. But it was with the industrial revolution that modern day leisure tourism started to emerge. Today, tourism is one of the world’s largest industries, with international tourist arrivals surpassing the one billionth milestone for the first time in history. (Wikipedia. Accessed on 08/01/14). Internationally balance of payments grew to UD$1.03 trillion, an increase of 3.8% from 2010. A report from the UN World Tourism
Organisation forecasts an estimated growth of the tourism industry of about 3.8% per year up to 2020. Tourism in the Maltese Islands has grown accordingly, with it being one of the main drivers of the Maltese economy. In this report, I will focus on the impact tourism has on
Victoria, the capital city of Gozo, in terms of economy, environment, society and culture.

Tourism

Tourism deals with tourists, which represent the demand side and the tourist product, which represents the supply side. Alternatively, it could be seen as an exchange of goods and services between a consumer and a supplier. Tourism also interacts with different environments such as social, cultural, political, natural, economic and technological. Such impacts can be negative, positive or both. Furthermore these impacts can overlap meaning that a person in a community could be positively affected by the economic impact of tourism while another person in the same community could be negatively affected through the environmental perspective. Destination Area

J. Child & co refer to a destination area as a place having characteristics known to enough

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visitors to justify it as an entity independently attracting and motivating travel itself. Victoria has all the attributes necessary to be a