Critical Analysis of India’s Ecotourism Strategy
 

E cotourism has gained widespread acceptance in the tourism industry all over the country and has been identified as one of the fastest-growing sectors in the recent past. Various Indian states have recognised ecotourism as having the highest potential for the economic development of the country and have initiated different ecotourism activities for livelihood creation as well as conservation and protection of the fragile ecosystem. The efforts of the Government of India are commendable as they understand the need for a National Strategy for Ecotourism. However, addressing the problem of biodiversity loss, land degradation, and local participation through ecotourism seems to have been ignored.

The National Strategy for Ecotourism, launched in June 2022 by the Ministry of Tourism, has evolved from the Ecotourism Policy and Guidelines 1998. The revised policy has focussed on pertinent issues missed in the Policy for Ecotourism in Forest and Wildlife Areas of 2018 including capacity building, marketing, and public and private partnership.

The Development Alternatives initiative on ‘Livelihood through Ecotourism’ in Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand allowed us an opportunity to critically examine the National Ecotourism Policy to understand how alternative models of tourism help in nature conservation. The project had a combination of both intensive desk research as well as on-ground study to grasp the needs and demands of the community. The project not only tried to explore opportunities for sustainable livelihood options for the local inhabitants of the two mountainous states but also drive the state governments’ initiatives of promoting ‘ecotourism’ to garner employment generation, especially for women and youth in the region.

Ringal (dwarf bamboo) artisan from Thatta village, Mandi

The policy, however, has fallen short on some major underpinning issues in terms of providing realistic support to forest-dependent communities. It lacks focus on government procurement of local handicrafts and handloom products of artisans. One of its mandates is to support alternative livelihoods for forest-dependent communities; yet, there is no synergy with the MSME procurement policy, which aims to promote and develop micro and small enterprises by supporting them in the marketing of products produced and services rendered by them.

The policy also does not lay stress on the support ecosystem required for setting up an ecotourism business. Today, there is no incentive for running an ecotourism enterprise, for example, a homestay. Moreover, there is a debate around the ‘green-washing’ of hotel enterprises under the homestay banner, claiming to be green without any valid third-party certification. Currently, Himachal Pradesh has 2,305 registered homestays and 3,679 registered hotels (Chauhan, 2021). However, a huge chunk of homestays and hotels are operational without registration with the state tourism department. The exact number of operational homestays is said to be higher than the registered homestays. This leads to poor management of natural resources. In most cases, it is sort of green-washing the hotel business under the name of ecotourism. There are constant disputes between homestay enterprises and hotel business operators.

The coming of the age of the ecotourism industry is mostly led by social enterprises and NGOs. Although the revised policy has stressed public and private partnership to increase the visibility of ecotourism, it has not focused on the monitoring mechanisms of these enterprises. In crude terminology, many of these enterprises work as aggregators and marketing agencies that connect travellers with local communities to provide ecotourism services like homestays, nature tours, and other experiential activities. There is no room left for feedback from local communities on their experiences and satisfaction level with social enterprises. This implies that local participation remains very restricted.

Furthermore, other pertinent issues such as unregulated construction and carrying capacity remain unaddressed in the policy. The fragile ecosystem of the Himalayan states is the most vulnerable to unregulated construction. And, the region has been witnessing haphazard construction without any appropriate clearance mechanism. A 2017 report by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) concluded that in rural Himachal Pradesh, around 90% of buildings, primarily residential, have flouted rules of safe construction. Additionally, as per the report, 83% of the sample 300 buildings in Shimla were found to be highly vulnerable to earthquakes (Khanna, 2019).

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