Poverty Alleviation and Community Based Tourism: Experiences from Central and South Asia

This publication reports on pilot activities carried out in eight Central and South Asian countries between 2002 and 2005 as part of the UNESCO project Development of Cultural and Ecotourism in the Mountainous Regions of Central and South Asia. The activities aimed at developing community-based ecotourism in order to help bring the economic and other benefits of increasing tourism to poorer members of rural communities in remote mountainous areas.

Details of these activities, showing their design, development and results, are given in sections three and five of this report, making the project as a whole a true “laboratory of ideas” for policy makers and project managers working on similar issues, as well as for government, members of the tourism industry wanting to contribute to local communities, and NGOs and international organizations.

Among the most useful aspects of this paper are its policy recommendations, particularly since these have emerged from grassroots work with local communities in the field. Working in eight countries and at ten project sites, the diverse experiences of community-based ecotourism development reported on here have been a source of strength to the project and to its wider policy implications, since activities have in each case been developed to fit local conditions and in consultation with local communities.

The project Development of Cultural and Ecotourism in the Mountainous Regions of Central and South Asia was implemented directly in the field with local NGOs and local communities and accumulated a wealth of experience and expertise at grassroots level. It has also garnered some impressive results, demonstrating how household incomes can be increased by 25% through community-based tourism, how young people and women can benefit from the opportunities for employment and skills building that increasing tourism can bring, and how the natural environment and cultural heritage can be protected and conserved through community involvement in tourism.

The project is part of a UNESCO cross-cutting initiative on the Eradication of Poverty, Especially Extreme Poverty, approved as part of the Organization’s Medium-Term Strategy, 2002-2007. Among the objectives of the strategy are broadening the focus of international and national poverty reduction strategies through the mainstreaming of education, culture, the sciences and education; supporting the establishment of linkages between national poverty reduction strategies and sustainable development frameworks and mobilizing social capital by building capacities and institutions and helping to enable the poor to enjoy their rights; and contributing to an enabling national policy framework and environment for empowerment, participatory approaches and livelihood generation.