Beyond Greening - Tourism Watch

Beyond Greening: Reflections on Tourism in the Rio-Process | PositioningpaperEco-Tourism – Great Potential for Economic Development in Extractive ReservesPrainha do Canto Verde pioneered community tourism in Brazil when the residents started toexplore the activity in an organized fashion in 1998. Women, men and adolescents providetourism services in guesthouses, restaurants, or by offering transfers, excursions, and eco-trailswith local guides. Community and school infrastructure is used to organise meetings withgroups from schools and universities, and exchange visits from protected areas from aroundthe country.Service groups provide coffee breaks and look after the meeting room facilities where allnecessary equipment – television, video and data show – is available and community groupstalk about the village history. Other residents use their talents for arts and handicrafts whichare sold at the local fair trade shop together with natural products from the village and othercommunities from the state of Ceará which joined in the community tourism and fair tradenetworks.The TUCUM tourism network already has 12 members along the 574 km coastline of the stateof Ceará. Six fair trade outlets of the Bodega Network are consolidating their marketing effortand planning to sell online soon. Other people benefitting from the demand of tourists forhealthy food are local farmers. The great advantage of community tourism is that nobodydepends on the tourism revenue for survival, so the people can live with the low season.Income from tourism, arts and handicrafts, family agriculture and computer andcommunication services complement income from the principal activities like fishing,hunting, foresting, and agriculture depending on the eco-system where the community islocated.Since the community of Prainha do Canto Verde has joined Extractive Reserves in 2009, it hasdrawn attention to the potential of eco-tourism. Prainha do Canto Verde receives over 1,200tourists per year with 3,105 overnights distributed in five guesthouses. Several groups fromother protected areas from all over Brazil have already visited Prainha and the case study hasbeen presented in workshops joining hundreds of people from RESEX and other protectedareas. We hope that Instituto Chico Mendes will join forces with the Ministry of Tourism todevelop this promising segment of tourism to promote economic development, natureconservation and meaningful, sustainable poverty reduction.84