Kilimanjaro Hope Organization (KIHO)
  • Home
  • News updates
  • Who we are
    • Team
    • Our mission & vision
    • Our foundation
    • Kilimanjaro region
    • KIHO's partners
  • What we do
    • Areas of operation >
      • Water
      • Food security
      • Income-generation
      • Education
    • Projects >
      • Beekeeping
      • Biogas
      • Contour terraces
      • Road construction
      • Tree nursery
      • Former projects >
        • Cultural exchange
    • Target groups >
      • Children
      • Youth
      • Women
    • KIHO's approach
    • KIHO’s understanding of sustainability
  • Take action
    • 10 Things We Need >
      • Help a Child Smile
      • Plant 20,000 trees to sustain the ecosystem
      • Water for a school, every drop counts!
      • Honey is money
      • Adding value to organic fruits
      • Sponsor a solar food dryer for sustainable farming
      • Construct a biogas plant to promote renewable energy
      • Support women with 2,000 improved chicks
      • Basic supplies for a rural dispensary
      • Building a water irrigation pond
    • Become a volunteer
    • KIHO Volunteers
  • Photogallery
  • Contact us

First results of the potential of eco-cultural tourism

21/5/2013

0 Comments

 
Picture
With a three day visit in Chome last week, the first phase of assessing the potential of eco-cultural tourism has been concluded for KIHO. We learned many things during our visits to a traditional healer, a Maasai boma, Gonja village, Tona Lodge in Mbaga, the tourist offices in Lushoto in the Usambara mountains as well as Chome with Shengena Forest. It was very interesting to see the successes but also the challenges that other places that have tourism established to some degree face with their visitors. We hope to start soon with this project that will help the local communities to generate additional income.

PictureSunset from the Flat Rock in Chome
In comparison to the most established tourism spot in this area, Lushoto, where a lot of guesthouses and lodges are already established, in the Southern Pare mountains the accommodation will be mostly based on home stays or as alternatively camp sites can be offered. The training of tour guides will be a major challenge because while the local people all speak Kiswahili and Kipare, the level of English is often not so good. It is not really an option though to bring in tour guides from other parts of Tanzania, because they would not know the Pare culture nor do they speak Kipare.

Most likely KIHO wants to set up a company that will benefit community projects as well as the further development of KIHO, thus it is again the rural communities in Same District that will benefit from eco-cultural tourism. One difficult thing will what this entity will do during the low season as we realize that established tourist places have a very hard time to get tourists during half of the year – or even more than that! It will be important to attract visitors throughout the year with an interesting program.

Ecological tourism means for us that we want to have a “light footprint” when our future tourists will come to Same and then go to the different villages. The environmental impact should be as minimal as possible although certain things like transport can hardly be avoided. KIHO will certainly promote in all villages tree planting as well as watershed management that will help to enrich and protect the bio-diversity but also increase the output of farmers thanks to less soil erosion and a better use of the water that is available.

KIHO understands cultural tourism as the promotion and the protection of the Pare culture, but also the Maasai culture in the lowlands of Same District. The sharing of life at home or on the farm, traditional dancers, traditional healers and story-telling can be a very valuable exchange of the local people with our visitors and it is an incentive for the rural communities to remember their heritage instead of giving it up.

In combination, eco-cultural tourism should be the chance for the local communities in the Southern Pare mountains to have additional income-generating opportunities through offering home stays for the visitors, perform dances, offer handicraft work or be tour guides during part of the year. Please, keep in touch with us with any ideas. And we count on you that you will help us to promote such kind of tourism in the Southern Pare mountains that will ultimately benefit our people and help them to get out of poverty.


0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    News Updates

    On this page you can find news updates about KIHO. Please feel free to comment.

    Archives

    November 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    August 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012

    Categories

    All
    Agriculture
    Alternative Energy
    Beekeeping
    Challenges
    Conflict
    Eco Cultural Tourism
    Eco-cultural Tourism
    Food Processing
    Fundraising
    Grant Proposal
    Grant Proposal
    Income Generation
    Local Community
    Maasai
    Networking
    Office
    Pare Mountains
    Road Construction
    Training
    Volunteers
    Water

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.