Boost for Sri Lanka's eco-tourism

TES head visits Medirigiriya to experience first-hand our move in the right direction

By Laila Nasry

She teaches at the international eco-tourism planning and management workshops of the George Washington University and has written two books on this subject close to her heart. Presently Megan is writing a third book for the United Nations. To say she is a leading authority on eco-tourism would be an understatement.

Megan was on a brief visit to Sri Lanka on the invitation of the Eco-tourism Society of Sri Lanka (ESSL), funded by the Technology Initiatives for the Private Sector (TIPS). Her mission was to study the eco-tourism resource base, both the natural and cultural heritage sites, and write a report recommending the potential of eco-tourism in the country. 

Sri Lanka relies heavily on tourism as a revenue-generator. Thus eco-tourism, which is generally heeded with suspicion and confusion is an important tool, which according to TES means the responsible travel to natural areas that conserve the environment and sustain the well-being of the local people.

"It is a real industry of real people who believe in the ecological way of tourism and feel that people will be willing to pay a high value for the true value of our culture and environment," Megan stressed. 

This industry enables the management of tourism in a natural and cultural environment. Facilitating the movement of people around the landscape without harming it. The benefits of eco-tourism far exceed just the added revenue earned by the country, but promise to protect the ecology, generate new jobs and thereby increase community income, which will result in economic growth etc. 

An ecotourism pilot project funded by the Provincial Council and local council is currently underway in Medirigiriya. It hopes to develop locations for tourist visits and despite Megan's tight schedule she went there and was impressed by the work.

Megan had met villagers and discussed what the project meant to them. "The villagers are very enthusiastic. They are into organic agriculture and hope to sell their produce at the food stands. The women too had a role to play — producing crafts for sale. It's really great because these are all their ideas and not ours."

She felt that local level planning was good. "There was genuine political support." 

However, Megan did identify a few shortcomings, mainly the scarcity of local tour operators. She felt this was one way the country lost large amounts of revenue, "as much as 90% which is taken away by international tour operators". She stressed the need to develop packaging and marketing skills to "reduce the leakage of revenue by 30%-40%". 

Megan highlighted the importance of protecting our cultural heritage sites and implementing strong measures to lessen the potential impact of the damage caused by visitors. Though Sri Lanka has a guiding certificate process she said it was important that enhanced programmes be conducted for local guides, to cater to the specialised needs in ecotourism. 

Megan, assisted by two other global resource persons will return to Sri Lanka in September to conduct an intensive five-day seminar and workshop for 40 people on ecotourism destination planning.

A day each will be devoted to the following topics: ecotourism principles; national and regional planning; tourism industry development for tour companies and lodges; interpreting planning and how to create a site that would help visitors enjoy both the culture and the environment; and marketing instruments and its effects on tourism. 

Through the workshop she hopes to initiate a step-by-step interactive programme, vision statements and simple objectives which would enable participants to carry out their action plans.

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