ABSTRACT
The major objective of this work was to examine the economic importance of hospitality industry to the nation.
A strategic random technique was used to select the respondents from the hospitality industries using interview and survey method.
In conclusion, the outcome of this study reveals that hospitality industry is of great importance to the economy of the nation.

CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY
The hospitality industry is a broad category of field within the service industry that includes lodging, restaurants, event planning, theme parks, transportation, cruise line, and additional fields within the tourism industry.

The hospitality industry is a several billion dollar industry that mostly depends on the availability of leisure time and disposable income.

A hospitality unit such as a restaurant, hotel, or even an amusement park consists of multiple groups such as facility maintenance, direct operations (servers, house keepers, porters, kitchen workers, bartenders etc), management, marketing and human resources.
The Oxford Advance Learner Dictionary (1995) defined Hospitality as the reception and entertainment of guests, visitors or strangers with liberty and goodwill.
The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (1995) defined Hospitality as friendly behaviour towards visitors.
The Hospitality industry can be broadly defined as the collection of business providing accommodation and or food and beverages to people who are away from home.
The hospitality industry is a service industry which provides food, drink and accommodation to meet the needs of the domestic and international leisure and tourism.
Hospitality industry is a major employer.

Hospitality industry includes service sector work like tourism and food service. It suffers from more economic fluctuations compared to its peer industries.
The hospitality industry is a major service sector in the world economy.

The industry encompasses an extensive variety of service industries that include food service, tourism and hotels.
Hospitality industry can be empirically divided into two parts: entertainment areas like clubs and bars, and accommodation. Accommodation takes the form of public houses, resorts, inn, campgrounds, hotels, hostels, serviced apartments, and motels.

The clubs and bars category include restaurants, fast foods and night clubs.
The hospitality industry also includes tourism support commercial activities like airline cabin staff and travel agents.

Travel technology like applied information technology (IT) and its workers in hospitality industry, travel and tourism are included in the hospitality industry. Corporate entertainment is also a very thriving activity amongst corporation.
A hotel is an establishment that renders lodging in Lieu of payment.

This lodging is usually given in exchange for a specified predetermined amount of money.

Modern hotel rooms come equipped with climate control and attached bathrooms.

Higher end hotels offer guests internet connectivity within rooms and also throughout the premises.

A combination of meals and accommodation comes as a package in most hospitality establishments.

Hotels are usually managed by professionally qualified managers.

Junior workers usually maintain the hotel. Functions like cooking is usually done by professionally trained chefs.
Hospitality industries are characterized by a large number of employees.

Both white collar employees and blue collar workers may find gainful employment.

Entry level jobs usually require no formal education.

Professionals in the hospitality sector are usually qualified with trade certificates and college degrees.

Many hospitality schools offer specialized courses of study in one particular aspect of the industry.
The hospitality industry is rather unique among the major industries of the country in that it is comprised of a great variety of skilled and unskilled occupations, many common only to the industry and others related to various outside trades and professions including chefs, managers, plumbers, carpenters, porters, book keepers, secretaries, engineers, sales people, printers, telephone operators, elevator operators, upholsters, painters, bell hops, accountants, cashiers, assistant waiters, electricians, foreign language interpreters, security people, public relations specialists and scores of other occupation.
In recent years the term hospitality has become increasingly popular as an all embracing nomenclature for a large grouping of organizations including hotels.

As a collective term, the hospitality industry can be taken to include hotels, motels, guest houses, bed and breakfast; farm houses, holiday parks, restaurants, fast food outlets, cafes, departmental store catering; public houses, clubs; industrial catering, institutional catering and the related area of tourism and leisure.

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
Hospitality industry is associated with some problems which are listed below
• Cost of construction
• Climatic change
• Technology and demographics
• Travel permit
• Wage levels
• Recruiting and retaining skilled labour
• Lack of importance given to training and satisfaction.

1.3 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The economy of any nation is affected by the food served in both homes and in the eating establishments of the country.

It is the primary responsibility of the hospitality industry to provide food for people of all ages, in all walks of life, at all times of the day or night, and in every situation.

The caterer should not only identify the people’s hospitality needs, but should also ensure that customers get necessary services required.
The hospitality industry plays a very significant role in the following areas:
• Provision of food and drinks: One of the importances of the hospitality industry is the provision of food and drinks.

This is done mostly in the hotels and restaurants.
Most hotels provide breakfasts, lunches, teas, drinks and snacks and banquets.

Hotels ranges from the palatial, first class luxury hotels to small hotels owned and run as family business.
Restaurants will vary with the kind of meals they serve.

While some will serve all types of meals, others will either serve lunch and dinner or lunch and tea.

Banquet will also be part of the restaurant operations.

There are exclusive top class restaurants and small roadside ‘bukar’ and cafeterias.

Also, some restaurants are popular for some specialty foods e.g. Mr. Biggs, French Café etc.
• Job Creation: Another importance attached to the hospitality is in the areas of job opportunities.

Many jobs are created in the hospitality industry.

This includes both skilled jobs as well as semi skilled jobs.
As earlier mentioned, there are different sectors that make up the hospitality industry.

These various sectors are hotels, restaurants, fast food shops, take away shops, welfare catering, outdoor catering, school meal serve etc.

These various outlets provide job as opportunities in the areas of managers, administrative staff, security personnel, maintenance staff etc.

This has helped in the overall development of the Nigerian economy.
• Revenue Generation: Revenue generation has been an importance contribution to the Nigerian economy.

OTher government generates huge amount of revenue from the activities of the various sectors that make up the hospitality industry.

Revenue is generated in the form of company tax, registration fees, monthly/quarterly subscription; Value Added Tax (VAT) among others.
• Increase Tourism Participation