Way to Go! Ecotourism demonstrates community strength in Central Dooars
Tuesday, December 14th, 2010It is heartening to note that the seeds of Ecotourism movement have started sprouting in Central Dooars after Help Tourism stepped in to develop a demonstration model in Chilapata Wildlife Sanctuary three years ago. Since then several initiatives have been taken by the local communities and the movement is getting stronger and exemplary.
The fact that the local villagers are taking increasing interest to develop community enterprises in the tourism sector following the guidelines of Ecotourism was evident in a series of workshops held in Rajabhatkhawa and Raimatang recently.
Rajabhatkhawa has a long history and, as a gateway to the majestic Buxa Tiger Reserve, it is already well-known in the tourism circuits of Eastern Dooars. Although tourism started in Buxa landscape quite a few years ago the local communities did not have until recent times any specific direction or model to follow to make it sustainable and equitable. Buxa is a designated Tiger Reserve and a critically important wildlife habitat which supports many wildlife corridors since it is contiguous to Bhutan and Assam. With our tourism projects in East & Northeast India we have shown that community-based Ecotourism can effectively drive conservation and ensure poverty alleviation. We took this campaign and experience to the communities of Eastern Dooars as well through the Chilapata Jungle Camp model and it produced excellent result and received overwhelming response.
Mr. Ramkumar Lama – a local community leader and social activist took the leadership and stepped up the campaign and motivated the communities to come forward.
From our past experience we have seen that every project site or destination adjoining the protected areas has its own dynamics, ground realities and different scopes based on which the tourism-based and associated livelihoods should be conceived and developed which must benefit the local communities and aid the conservation of the wildlife habitat.
In order to understand and discuss the local dynamics, scopes and available resources through exchange of ideas and expertise and create the climate for implementation of Ecotourism projects at the local level, Ramkumar and his organization Yugantar Pariwar organized the workshops on Eco & Tea Tourism in association with Help Tourism as their Resource Partner and active participation of Khetriya Gramin Bank and the local branch of Art of Living Foundation at the Forest lodge in Rajabhatkhawa and at Sahid Ajay Lama Eco Park in Raimatang beat of Buxa Tiger Reserve on 29th & 30th November and 17th to 19th December 2010 respectively.
All local stakeholders, self-help groups, NGOs, representatives from travel trade-local administration-department of agriculture and forest, local villagers and experts from various relevant fields attended the workshops and had extensive interaction and discussion about the possibility and scope of developing community-based tourism business in the area. Our colleague Ms.Tapashi Bose was present at both the workshops as the Resource Person from Help Tourism and explained the Help Tourism model to the participants through presentation and interactive class.
Ram Kumar Lama gave a very interesting presentation about the enormous potential of community-based tourism in this part of Dooars which can attract Ecotourists from different parts of the country and abroad because of its captivating natural beauty and ethnic and cultural diversity. The area has several protected wildlife parks and foothill forests, tea gardens, hills, snow-fed rivers, heritage and historical sites and tribal settlements. The possibility of developing circuits based on various special interest travels such as heritage tourism, cultural tourism, craft tourism, home stays and tea tourism with interesting activities such as treks, bird watching, butterfly watching, bi-cycle tours, Elephant-back rides, tribal cultural tour, local cuisine tour, study tour, hiking tour etc. was discussed at the workshops. The local villagers expressed keen interest to develop home hospitality business in their villages.
The experts from Khetriya Gramin Bank gave very useful information about the bank loans available for Ecotourism business and interest on loans and repayment modalities. They also explained the benefits of Kisan Credit Cards and how this can help local villagers to be a part of Ecotourism business and earn from Organic food cultivation, farming of medicinal plants etc. and protect the environment.
The importance of preservation and maintenance of historical sites, especially the Buxa Fort which used to be a cellular jail during the freedom struggle and Gangutia Monastery which dates back to 1936 and is an important Buddhist shrine was discussed at the workshops and it was decided that concerned departments will be approached with specific proposals for financial and other assistances to preserve these heritage sites and facilitate the tourists to visit the sites.
Hearty local meal prepared by the villagers was served at the workshops. The workshops concluded with questions-answers and interviews in which the famous writer from Jalpaiguri Mr.Punyashlok Dasgupta confirmed that he will highlight the initiatives taken by the local youth through his articles and write ups.
Field training and capacity building workshops on rural/home hospitality management and operations, training and workshop on construction of local-style and sustainable accommodation and identification of various guided tourism activities and experiences to create a whole range of specialized and unique tourism products, waste and natural resource management etc. will be organized in the next phase.
