Sustainable community-based tourism (CBT) through homestay programme in Sabah, East Malaysia

Homestay programme is one of several community-based tourism activities which has the potential of advancing the rural community. In order to succeed in this programme, the parties involved, especially the homestay operators need to identify suatainable approaches that can simultaneously bring economic benefits to them and satisfaction to the tourists. The purpose of this study is to examine domestic tourists’ satisfaction with the quality of the homestay service in Mesilou Village, Kundasang, Sabah. The measurement for satisfaction was based on the mean analysis of a questionnaire survey findings involving 85domestic tourists visiting the homestays. Qualitative in-depth interviews of stakeholders and field observation were also conducted to gain further insights . The results of the study show that all of the domestic tourists were satisfied with the services , facilities and safety of the homestay programme as indicated by the satisfaction mean value of 4.193-4.4157. The study is pivotal to the stakeholders in the homestay programme especially the homestay operators who really should be aware the expectations of the domestic tourists.