In a bid to raise awareness of conservation at a national and global level as well as build Uganda’s image as a prime sustainable tourism destination, the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) with support from the USAID funded STAR - Uganda (Sustainable Tourism in the Albertine Rift) program, launched an awareness and promotional campaign, Friend-a-Gorilla (www.friendagorilla.org). The campaign uses social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) to inform people about the Gorilla’s activities and build awareness of these unique animals. People can ‘friend’ a gorilla, learn about their gorilla, see video’s and pictures, and receive updates from the rangers on their activities. The program officially launched on September 26th and already has 15,000 followers on Facebook. The program was also covered by hundreds media outlets, including CNN International, USA Today and BBC News.

To assist UWA in this effort, STAR engaged Hollywood stars Jason Biggs, Kristy Wu, and Simon Curtis, to launch the campaign and act as Uganda’s spokespeople for conservation. The stars went gorilla trekking as part of the launch along with the Uganda cabinet Minister of Tourism Kahinda Otafire.  Upon returning to Hollywood, the celebrities hosted "Rumble in the Concrete Jungle" and invited other famous Hollywood personalities. A delegation from Uganda and a variety of specialty tour operators who promote Uganda were also invited. The campaign is serving as a tool to raise awareness and funds for conservation.

STAR is a 5-year program of the Global Sustainable Tourism Alliance, started in August 2009.

Sixteen graduate students from The George Washington University (GWU) and nine undergraduate tourism students from four universities within the Dominican Republic joined forces in June 2009 to boost sustainable tourism in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic. The GWU International Consulting Practicum is offered every summer as a School of Business Study Abroad Program. It involves a six-week cooperative effort between graduate students from GWU and host country universities focused on a real-life consulting assignment. The Dominican students represented four universities including Pontificia Universidad Católica Madre y Maestra, Universidad Dominicana O & M, Centro Universitario Región Atlántica - Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo and Universidad Tecnológica de Santiago. The team worked together on projects with their client, the Puerto Plata Cultural Tourism Cluster.

The Cluster is an organization of prominent tourism professionals and business owners that seeks to diversify Puerto Plata’s tourism product while strengthening the link between the all-inclusive mass tourism model and the local economy to increase the overall sustainability and competitiveness of the destination.

USAID fostered the growth and expansion of the Cluster in partnership with the Dominican Sustainable Tourism Alliance (DSTA).

The consultants focused their work on three projects including developing a marketing plan for the Cluster’s new destination website; creating a preliminary business plan for a visitor information and interpretation center; and formulating a plan to develop the Los Dominguez Nature Center and Trails, a new community-based tourism hiking circuit on Mount Isabel de Torres.

While in the Dominican Republic, the consultants and their local counterparts conducted interviews, focus groups, surveys and inventories to prepare a set of final recommendations. Findings and recommendations were presented to the client, the Puerto Plata Cluster, and to a wider community of stakeholders in Santo Domingo. The Practicum was conducted under the aegis of the Global Sustainable Tourism Alliance (GSTA) with the support from USAID and the DSTA.

Celebratory Event Marking the Closure of the GSTA Program in Ecuador

Read more about the successful AETS project.

September 2009 marked the completion of the successful GSTA project in Ecuador. Over the past two and a half years, the Alianza Ecuatoriana para el Turismo Sostenible (AETS) has made significant gains in developing sustainable tourism as a means to improve protected areas in Ecuador while demonstrating social, cultural, and economic benefits to rural populations. AETS management established the first tourism program office within the Ministry of Environment (MAE) to help govern sustainable tourism development in protected areas; implemented a national marketing strategy with the Ministry of Tourism (MINTUR) to support the new protected area tourism program.

It demonstrated tangible results in eight key protected areas thorough visitor infrastructure development, implementing state of the art monitoring tools and mechanisms to mitigate tourism impacts, the launch of four innovative community-based enterprises, increase market access for over one hundred businesses and communities, and by gaining widespread public support for protected areas in Ecuador.

The eight protected areas that benefited directly from the project include: Cotopaxi; Chimborazo; Mangalares Churute; Machalilla, Cotocachi-Cayapas, Cayambe-Coca, Yasuni-Cuyabeno and the Galapagos.

USAID funded the development of the AETS in partnership with the Government of Ecuador and the Global Sustainable Tourism Alliance (GSTA). AETS is an alliance of over 70 Ecuadorian and international partners who represent the Government of Ecuador (GOE), non-governmental organizations, and private sector organizations dedicated to stimulating economic growth, alleviating poverty, conserving biodiversity, and creating greater stewardship for natural resources through sustainable tourism development in Ecuador. AETS was a pioneering program in Ecuador, the first to comprehensively address structural issues in the sector at the system level, while demonstrating true community-based tourism development.

AETS was launched in May 2007 at a national “Whole System in the Room” meeting which brought together over 100 key stakeholders engaged in sustainable tourism development in Ecuador to define common ground and major actions for the program. As a basis for its approach, AETS used innovative approaches such as SCALE™, which rely on participatory and catalytic actions among a diverse group of stakeholders in order to broaden the impact of development initiatives. The approach enabled the AETS to leverage over $3.0M in additional resources to $3.0M of USAID funding. The resulting program aimed to ensure better management of Ecuador’s biodiversity and natural resource base; promote benefits from conserving biodiversity to rural Ecuadorians by generating employment opportunities; attract and stimulate investment in the sector; and, showcase the country’s national patrimony to international and national visitors.

The STARS Program aims to improve Northern Montenegro’s tourism sector by attracting investment, enhancing linkages, increasing marketing capabilities, and developing cohesive regional branding.

On May 25th and 26th, STARS held two Tourism Workgroup Forums in Zabljak and Kolasin for forty-one individuals from private, non-profit, and government sectors. The participants included representatives from local and regional tour operators, restaurants and accommodations, and destination management organizations.

Jack Delf, owner of Black Mountain tours and former advertising executive, introduced the workshop’s goals and explained the emergence of an adventure-driven European market in which northern Montenegro could position itself as a leading destination. Mr. Delf previewed the STARS marketing and packaging workshopthat occured in late June 2009 by offering best-practice techniques for running successful operations, identifying target markets, attracting western European travelers, and creating networks for future cooperation among tourism businesses.

Participants wish to continue to discussion in-between monthly workshops. They held interim one-on-one meetings in order to fully prepare for the June Workshop, where they will received further information from STARS tourism development experts, Costas Christ and Christina Heyniger.

The Forum concluded with a frank roundtable discussion on current business needs and their potential solutions, helping to define target areas for STARS project assistance.

As workshop participants acknowledged the need for additional dialogue on tourism business needs, STARS will be conducting small group sessions to further identify business-specific and cross-sectoral assistance opportunities.

TOUR OPERATOR OUTREACH YIELDING MARKET INSIGHTS & VALUABLE LINKAGES IN ETHIOPIA

Tour Operator interviews in Ethiopia

To develop successful and sustainable tourism products, the GSTA strongly believes that a market-driven approach is required. In Ethiopia, according to a recent World Bank study, 95% of all leisure tourists use tour operators. Therefore, outreach to operators in Ethiopia is essential for understanding the market, as well as for promoting new products that ESTA will help develop.

In the first major outreach initiative, ESTA consultant Brad Weiss and ESTA Ecotourism Product Development Specialist Mekonnen Gebre Egziabher conducted a survey with 20 of Ethiopia’s most influential tour operators.

The survey had two main components. The first was aimed at better understanding the profile and habits of tourists in Ethiopia.

The second focused on the operators’ experiences and opinions regarding ESTA’s four geographic focal areas: the Central Rift Valley, Southern Rift Valley, Bale Mountains National Park, and Awash National Park.

Not only were the interviews highly insightful, but they also helped establish relationships with key tour operators. These relationships will be valuable as ESTA seeks operators’ continued advice on specific products (in some cases through familiarization trips), ideally culminating in the operators integrating the new products into their itineraries. During the interviews, operators in fact expressed great enthusiasm for collaborating with ESTA, recognizing the advantages of diversifying their offerings.

Several other tour operator surveys are scheduled, including a similar survey for international tour operators, who also have much influence in determining itineraries. Also, surveys will be conducted for both national and international operators specializing in bird-watching, a market that holds high potential for Ethiopia.

PRESERVING A NATURAL & CULTURAL SANCTUARY THROUGH COMMUNITY ACTION IN MALI

Euphorbia cuttings planted along dunes in the village of Kanikombole

Sacred crocodile in village of Borko

This article was originally written by Christina Nardone, Program Coordinator for the GSTA/PD program. It has been updated slightly since, but is mainly her description of her adopted country. Last year Christina died in a tragic accident. She was a shining star and an example for all of her colleagues and friends. She is greatly missed. 

Study Released: Economic Valuation of Tourism in Peru's Protected Areas

CLICK HERE to download the Spanish version of the study

 
GSTA Managing Partner, The Nature Conservancy (TNC), recently announced the completion of a comprehensive study on the valuation of tourism in Peru's protected areas. The Spanish-language document, Valoración Económica del Turismo en el Sistema Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas por el Estado (Economic Valuation of Tourism in the National System of Protected Areas of the State of Peru) is now available for downloading. Partners for the study included the Ministry of the Environment, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism, the National Service of Protected Natural Areas and the private tourism sector (represented by the President of the Hotel Association of Peru).

The study was completed in the spring, and a public reception was held on June 4, 2009 in Lima. The event was hosted by Peru's Minister of Foreign Tourism Mercedez Araoz, and the Minister of Environment Antonio Black.

A panel of presenters addressed the potential and relevance of natural tourism in the country.  The panel included Mercedes Araoz, Minister of Foreign Tourism, Antonio Brack, Minister of the Environment, José Koechlin, President of the Hotel Association of Peru, and Tarsicio Granizo, Director of External Affairs, TNC.

The publication addresses the true value to Peru of tourism to national protected areas.  Although annual gate charge revenue for entrance into protected areas is a relatively modest at US$1.7 million (2007), the multiplicative effect of this tourism in terms of services purchased along the supply chain is orders of magnitude larger.  For example, in the city of Pisco, alone, goods and services acquired by visitors to Paracas National Park amount to $10 million annually.  The study evaluates the threshold of sustainability for the national protected areas system – the level of tourism tolerable without causing lasting harm to biological diversity while still maintaining the quality of the tourism experience.  To maintain the national system at the threshold, it will be necessary to increase the system’s annual expenses for tourism from US$161,000 annually to US$960,000.  Through practical changes in goods and services offered by the Ministry and by private concerns, including local communities, it would be possible to raise annual sales to tourists to US$12 million, with net profits for private concerns and communities of more than US$4 million and new income to the System of National Protected Areas of more than US$400,000.  The study make a compelling case that the Government of Peru would find it in the interest of the country’s economy to make up the difference to reach the threshold of sustainability because of the stimulatory effects that tourism to protected areas has on the national economy.

The National Service of Protected Natural Areas is identifying “pilot sites” for development of the threshold of sustainability and better management of tourism activities.  In addition, in the recently created San Fernando Reserve Zone (a marine/coastal protected area), the services is hoping to develop a tourism use plan using recommendations from the study.

GSTA Managing Partners

Academy for Educational Development

George Washington University

Solimar International

The Nature Conservancy

www.gstalliance.net

GSTA Implementing Partners

Conservation International

Citizens Development Corps/ Tourism Development Corps

Counterpart International

EplerWood International

Nathan Associates

National Geographic Society

Rainforest Alliance

RARE

University of Hawaii

UNESCO World Heritage Centre

USDA Forest Service-Heritage Design