2008-03-31

Donald Hawkins on Geotourism as Eco-Sensitive, Pro-Poor, Gender Fair, Peacemaking — and Someday Inclusive

Dr. Donald Hawkins is interviewed at the Ashoka Geotourism Challenge. He gives a good overview of how ecotourism is morphing into geotourism and cites some of the necessary alliances — pro-poor tourism and gender equity. Apparently we need to do more public education about the economic realities of disability and Article 30 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) for the disability community to regularly be cited in the litany of the ecosystem of geotourism allies:

While ecotourism is still associated with the natural environment, there is now a sensitivity to the cultural dimension as well, and strong emphasis on engaging and involving the communities that surround very valued, high-quality cultural and natural resources. This is one of the challenges we have in the years ahead: we have more work to do in finding ways of tapping into tourism—which is really the largest ever transfer of wealth from rich to the poorer countries. … is there potential for creating more business-related activities—such as tours, interpretation, facilities, or ecolodges—where consumers pay for services rendered and the money then sticks within the local communities in gateways near the protected areas?

He goes on to answer Lou D’Amore’s question and the one we addressed in the Ecumenical Council on Tourism’s anniversary issue of the Contours journal:

Can tourism be used to address the causes of conflict and war?

What we really need is the freedom to travel anywhere we want in the world, and to be safe and secure. Freedom to travel, and safety and security, are probably the main concerns that people who live in these places are concerned about too.

Then there’s the whole education side of travel. It is such an intensive opportunity to learn and gain practical exposure to the world. We certainly need more of that people-to-people contact in this day and age where there is so much conflict.

Now we are bringing together Lou D’Amore’s International Institute For Peace Through Tourism and the Institute for Corporate Responsibility (ICR), a new institute that has been created at the GW School of Business, to collaborating. They will be offering a symposium in May titled “Peace Through Commerce, Tapping the Potential of the Global Travel Industry.”

For the full interview:

http://www.changemakers.net/node/7069

This post was originally posted by RollingRains