PLANNING POLICY AND GUIDELINES FOR ECOTOURISM DEVELOPMENT WITHIN ADEN'S WETLANDS

 

 

 

PLANNING POLICY AND GUIDELINES FOR ECOTOURISM DEVELOPMENT WITHIN THE  WETLANDS (ADEN LAGOONS , AL-MIMLAH AND CALTEX – AL-HESWA)
 

 

EXCUTIVE SUMMARY

 

The Republic of Yemen is particularly well endowed with the key ingredients of successful ecotourism; nature, culture and hospitable local communities but these alone are not enough to secure the development of sustainable ecotourism opportunities. As well as the examples of regional ecotourism success, there also exist reports of low environmental standards, failed business and disappointed tourist. If the Source Natural Resources Management Programme is going to develop and maintain a reputation for quality nature and culture it needs to find a mechanism to assist operators to provide quality ecotourism products and experiences.

PLANNING POLICY AND GUIDELINES FOR ECOTOURISM DEVELOPMENT WITHIN ADEN'S WETLANDS

 

SNRMP has prepared sets of environmental planning guidelines and strategies to assist in the development and assessment of future ecotourism developments within the Wetlands areas in order to collectively identify actions that can address these issues. The programme suggests that small-scale community based ecotourism development is an appropriate form of tourism development for the Wetlands. Community based ecotourism development will ensure that benefits derived from tourism development are optimally distributed among stakeholders and that tourism resources are managed to achieve optimum benefits for all people.

 

The purpose of this study is to identify suitable ecotourism products that would provide income generation opportunities for local communities and protect biodiversity and investigate the market, technical feasibility of developing ecotourism products and provide recommendations for a possible a possible way forward.

 

The paper discusses the concepts of ecotourism, and sustainable tourism; provides a general overview of opportunities and issues; and suggest potential areas for intervention for market development. The intent is to provide a general overview of existing literature to generate new ideas and serve as a primer for the SNRMP team, an initiate actions aimed at stimulating tourism development on the area.

 

This report focuses on a detailed list of the ecotourism products, provides a SWOT analysis for each and an overview of the steps that need to be taken to overcome the barriers to their development.

 

The prioritized ecotourism options can be undertaken as an integrated part of developing a multi-stakeholder plan for sustainable community-based natural resource management. It will be necessary to address the policy and planning framework first through capacity building of government and non-governmental organizations at all levels, then stakeholder analysis with conflict resolution will be essential to generating inter- and intra- stakeholder group consensus on management issues. Alongside this, infrastructural barriers will need to be overcome and awareness raising aspects tackled. Finally through skill development and further capacity enhancement of CBOs enterprise development can get started. However it is important to make participatory business plans and market analysis of the options and to conduct research into the carrying capacity of different areas in the reserve to verify that the products and enterprises are not environmentally damaging and have a firm economic basis.

This report sets out the findings and recommendations arising from a brief mission to the Wetlands Protected Areas in Aden Governorate to determine the scope for developing ecotourism and prepare short term action plan.

 

The principle conclusions and recommendations are:

 

· Enhancement  of the multi-stakeholder committee for strengthening the management of the Wetlands biodiversity conservation;

· Address barriers to development through

- Building a supportive policy environment,

 - Developing infrastructure,

  - Raising awareness about biodiversity, Wetlands natural resources and about tourism     opportunities,

- Conflict management resolution

- Skill development for stakeholders

- Capacity building of government and non-government (NGO & CBO) organizations

· Conduct further research to access knowledge on: markets for products; stakeholders and their situations; participatory business plans for the enterprises; carrying capacity of different locations within the Wetlands area.

· In the light of the further research, develop the enterprise options identified in this report

· Develop a Participatory Sustainable Community-based Natural Resource Management Plan

· Implement this plan using participatory feedback systems from all stakeholders to maintain it.

If ecotourism is to develop in Aden Lagoons and make a significant contribution to economic and social development for local communities, there is underlying requirement to Ecotourism policy and management is well publicized and, more importantly, is translated into a series of implement able targets and actions and institution responsibilities identified. The active participation and co-ordination of all stakeholders of the tourism is central to achieving sustainable tourism development. It suggests that small-scale community-based tourism development is opportunity form of tourism development for local community based tourism development will ensure that benefits derived from ecotourism development are optimally distributed among stakeholders and that tourism resources are managed to achieve optimum benefits for the local communities.

Tourism can provide an opportunity to expand the Wetlands economic base and can bring to the community new skills and employment opportunities through the provision of services as accommodation, restaurants, information services, souvenirs and handicrafts. In the longer term, the benefits will be extended to the villages and will assist in community development and poverty alleviation.

Hopefully, this will stimulate follow-on social and environmental advantages including the recognition that preserved natural areas can generate ongoing employment in rural.

The SNRMP, together with the Environment Protection Authority (EPA)) and the Ministry of Water and Environment (MWE) will have the responsibility for the management and implementation of the programme.