Protected area management potential of ecotourism in mudumalai sanctuary and national park

Abstract

Tourism has emerged as the largest industry in the world with annual revenue of percentalmost $500 billion. Ecotourism is one of the fastest growing sectors in the tourism percentindustry at present. It has attracted increasing attention in recent years, not only as percentan alternative to mass tourism, but also as a means of economic development and percentenvironmental conservation. Ecotourism was earlier equated with nature tourism percentor adventure tourism. However now the distinction is being made and ecotourism percentis being defined as tourism that is linked to natural resource protection. This is in percentcontrast to the nature tourism that involves exploitation of natural resources. True percentecotourism requires a proactive approach that seeks to mitigate the negative and percentenhance the positive impacts of 'nature tourism'. Being a nature based tourism; it percenttakes into account the natural ecological attraction, their conservation and percentdevelopment. Its main aim is to safeguard the environment, making it beneficial to percentthe local people by generating revenue and education and pleasure for the tourist. percentTourism activity in a national park or any other protected area can serve as a selffinancing percentmechanism and so as a tool for conservation. India has a network of percentProtected Areas (P.A.s) comprising of 89 national parks and 493 wildlife percentsanctuaries covering 4.7pct. of the country's geographical area and which the percentWildlife Wings of the State Forest Departments are presently managing. India's percentgeographic diversity provides a range of ecosystems that could potentially support percenteco-tourism activities. Further successful ecotourism must benefit local percentpopulations economically and culturally to give them incentives to protect the percentnatural resources which create the attraction. percentHowever the main purpose with which Protected areas were established were for percentprotecting and conserving fragile ecosystems, which were rich in wildlife. Hence the percentconservation goal is supreme while managing any Protected area. percentThe increasing interest among the tourists to visit natural areas has put enormous percentpressure on the Protected areas. Unfettered ecotourism has encouraged many large percentresorts to come up, who pretended to follow eco-tourism policies in order to percentensure high rent capture. These resorts tended to cause wide scale ecological percentdegradation particularly in the fragile habitats. The visitation of tourists beyond the percentin percentcarrying capacities of the Parks has added to the problem. Tourism management in percentprotected areas has not always been a success; benefits have been gathered by a percentfew, support services from the government have been poor, often receiving percentinadequate funds, despite generating considerable funds for the central treasuries. percentLocal people have been adversely affected and relations with the authorities have percentoften been hostile. More than ever, it is now important that efforts to manage percenttourism in the protected areas are coordinated and that participation by key percentstakeholders takes place. percentThe concept cannot work unless it has the support of all the stakeholders and the percentbenefits are actually seen flowing to all of these stakeholders. Among them the percentrole of the local communities is critical. Their dependence on the Protected areas is percenthigher and hence their cooperation can ensure that the ecotourism policy would be percenta tool of conservation of the protected areas. percentThe aim of the research is to formulate an ecotourism policy for Mudumalai percentWildlife Sanctuary of Tamilnadu by evolving the elements for a framework of an percentecotourism policy. The aim is also to suggest workable institutional and regulatory percentmechanisms needed to implement such a policy. percentThe sanctuary is a biodiversity rich area with easy accessibility, high tourist percentvisitation. It has sizable human population including tribals in the fringe. The percentSanctuary on its periphery also has private sector initiative in nature tourism percentrelated ventures. percentAny ecotourism Policy for Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary must have elements of percentplanning with community participation, monitoring and evaluation to gauge the percentdegree of impact of tourism, Infrastructural and social capacity building, percentinstitutional development, zoning and regulation to manage the tourism on percentsustainable lines and finally elements of financial sustainability and promotion. percentLocal management committees need to be created where participatory decisionmaking percentcan take place. A State level Advisory Committee and a local level percentAdvisory Committee needs to be constituted. These institutions would be percentdeliberating on the institutional and regulatory mechanisms to carryout ecotourism percentactivities. For example, differential pricing of the park entrance fees can be percentresorted to augment resources for the improvement of the park and may include percentthe regulation of undesirable commercial growth in the fringe areas of the parks. percent