Traditional Village Homestays

Continued

Wangmo working at her stove (photo courtesy of Wendy Lama)

2001:

 

Community-based Ecotourism workshop, Leh, co-sponsored by the Ladakh Ecological Development Group

Rumbak community Parachute Café operators’ training, “Cooking for Tourists.” Read about this program at Community-based Tourism.

Tourism Enhancement Action Plan for Rumbak community

 

2002:

 

Himalayan Homestays: Pilot community-based eco-tourism project initiated in Rumbak. 13 visitors took part, from Brazil, Belgium, Italy, France, Canada and India. Read about this program at Community-based Tourism

Conducted a study tour of Corbett National Park for Ladakh homestay providers

 

2003:

 

SLC-India’s Ladakh Program Assistant Jigmet Dadul attended a Community-Based Tourism training workshop in Thailand at the Regional Community Forestry Training Centre for Asia and the Pacific (http://www.recoftc.org/)

Hosted the 4th Regional UNESCO Workshop on the Development of Cultural and Ecotourism in the Mountainous Regions of Central and South Asia. To read about this program visit UNESCO’s website.

Conducted the following activities in collaboration with The Mountain Institute, supported by UNESCO:

• Increased number of homestay providers to 32, including 18 within Hemis National Park in Rumbak, Skyu-Kaya and Chilling villages, and 14 outside the Park in the Sham -Hemsipachen area.
• A new Homestay brochure for Ladakh was developed locally
• Conducted ongoing visitor and homestay operator questionnaire surveys
• Khangchendzonga Conservation Committee visited the SLC-India office to assist in Homestay program assessment and future planning

 

2004:

 

Two skills training workshops provided for café operators in Hemis National Park, and 50 Ladakhi-English language cassettes,containing more than 30 common phrases used by visitors, prepared and distributed amongst the operators.

Fifteen potential Homestay operators from Spiti visited Ladakh to study eco-tourism operations; Operators and NGOs have also come from Nepal, Bhutan and Tajikistan to see how the program works and become involved in the program

Nature guide training held in India’s Kibber Wildlife Sanctuary. The training was accomplished through cross-cultural, professional networking with our partners in Sikkim, thus strengthening in-country capacity.

 

2005:

 

Under the direct sponsorship of UNESCO, SLC-India assumed responsibility for Homestay management and expansion.

Twenty-two Nature Guides were trained. One new site was developed in Ladakh with five new Homestay Providers, and three new sites in Zanskar with sixteen new Providers. In all, Homestays received 451 visitors. Solar showers were constructed in two sites in Ladakh, and six solar cookers were installed at Parachute cafes in three sites. Solar boiled water replaced sales of plastic mineral water bottles at Parachute cafes in six sites in Ladakh, thus helping conserve fuelwood and the areas’ fragile vegetation.

Himalayan Homestays received two international awards:

Travel + Leisure’s Global Vision Award for Community Outreach, in recognition of a project or organization that is defending the cultural historical or ecological integrity of the traveler’s world

World Travel Market First Choice Responsible Tourism Award

Look below for more information about these awards.

 

2006:

 

The Snow Leopard Conservancy – India Trust participated in a situation analysis for the Changthang Biodiversity Conservation and Rural Livelihoods Improvement project, sponsored by the World Bank Global Environment Fund.

FabIndia Overseas Pvt. Ltd. donated Rs. 150,000 worth home fabrics, curtains, and linens, helping Himalayan Homestay host families improve their guest rooms and increase visitation.

BBC Green Highlights SLC’s Homestays Program

BBC Worldwide has recently launched BBCGreen.com, a consumer lifestyle website for people interested in how they can combat climate change. They have told us that they found our website “to be a great resource for our readers”, and they have placed a link to our site at www.bbcgreen.com/.

Thank you BBC Green.

Snow Leopard Conservancy’s Homestay Program
Garners two Travel Industry Awards in 2005

The New York-based Travel+Leisure magazine presented the Snow Leopard Conservancy’s Homestays Program with a 2005 Global Vision Award for Community Outreach. The magazine introduced the awards in 2005, to recognize the most innovative projects and organizations that are defending the historical, cultural, and ecological integrity of the traveler’s world.

Travel+Leisure’s December ‘05 issue, honoring the award recipients, notes, “Himalayan Homestays is an exceptionally farsighted program . . . by putting guests into villagers’ homes and elevating the standards of their stay, the program has created an ecologically sensitive tourism infrastructure – and one that delivers funds directly to the communities themselves. It has also single-handedly transformed the common perception of the snow leopard, from that of a dangerous predator that attacks livestock to an animal whose presence draws travelers and provides important economic opportunities . . . Himalayan Homestays is a model of a self-sustaining – and profitable – conservation program.”

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