Today is World Tourism Day

aKerala joins other destinations in observing World Tourism Day on Saturday with success in taking tourism to the local level and it becoming a building block of sustainable development.

The much-lauded Responsible Tourism (RT) initiative has come into focus, as the theme for this year’s World Tourism Day is ‘Tourism and community development-focussing on the ability of tourism to empower people and provide them with skills to achieve change in their local communities.’

The consolidation of tourism’s economic influence has built up its social responsibility, and this can be seen in the stronger mandate given by Kerala to the tourism sector in economic and development policy planning.

“Only with the participation of the people can we find more suitable ways to develop tourism in our State while remaining a global leader,” says Minister for Tourism A.P. Anil Kumar.

The RT initiative, launched in 2007, has been identified as a global model for promoting community-based tourism activities in developing countries.

Capacity-building

The comprehensive skill/capacity building programme through the Kerala Institute of Tourism and Travel Studies (KITTS) has enabled the local community to take a proactive role in the tourism business. As many as 1,958 people have been trained as part of the RT initiative.

Village Life Experience packages, Ethnic Food Restaurant, Performance of Cultural Groups have brought home more than Rs.3 crore to the local community.

More than 3,000 community members have directly or indirectly benefited from the project.

Tourism Secretary Suman Billa is hopeful that the State can gift more ideas and models to the world for sustainable tourism development and make the world a better place to live.

The official celebrations will be in Guadalajara, Mexico, and coincide with the anniversary of the adoption of UNWTO statutes on September 27, 1970.

Kerala Tourism has organised photography and out-of-the-box idea contests on the occasion. KITTS, the nodal agency of RT, is organising a gathering of RT stakeholders at Kovalam.

A public awareness programme at Shanghumughom and seminar and quiz at Thalassery and Kochi have been organised.

The ATTOI is organising a seminar on community development through Ayurveda tourism.

The Hindu -   http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-kerala/responsible-tourism-in-focus/article6451752.ece., September 27, 2014