First Community-based Ecotourism Voluntary Guidelines Launched

The first voluntary guidelines on community-based ecotourism (CBET) establishment and management was launched in Kratie province early this week to promote CBET sites.

Supported by USAID Greening Prey Lang through a grant to Non-Timber Forest Product-Exchange Programme (NTFP-EP), the guidelines were developed collaboratively with stakeholders based on the experiences of communities, NGOs, and local authorities in the upper Mekong River region.

According to USAID Greening Prey Lang, these first formal guidelines cover identifying potential new CBET sites, selection of committee members, community capacity building, ecotourism product development, marketing strategies, governance, and monitoring.

They constitute a roadmap for successfully establishing and promoting CBET sites which contribute to improved livelihoods for communities and has strong links to natural resource conservation, said the source, explaining that when communities realise improved livelihood benefits from ecotourism and there is greater awareness of the relationship between protected natural areas and income from ecotourism, they are less likely to engage in illegal logging or fishing to ensure continued income from ecotourism.

 

 

Source: Agency Kampuchea Press