Ecotourism as a tool for Switching Community from Destructive to Non-destructive Activities

Asia-Pacific Environmental Innovation Strategies (APEIS) Research on Innovative and Strategic Policy Options (RISPO) Good Practices Inventory Ecotourism as a tool for Switching Community from Destructive to Non-destructive Activities Summary of the Practice Keywords: Tangkahan, Gunung Leuser National Park Strategy: Facilitating community-based tourism in protected areas Environmental areas: Ecosystem and biodiversity conservation, Forest conservation Critical instruments: Awareness/capacity building, Design, planning and management, Regulatory instruments, Self-regulation Country: Indonesia Location: Langkat regency, North Sumatra Participants: Villagers, Lembaga Pariwisata Tangkahan (LPT)/ Tangkahan Tourism Institution, Gunung Leuser National Park, Leuser Management Unit, Indecon, Palm Oil Plantation, Regency Tourism Office Duration: Since 2000 Funding: National Park Authorities, CEPF (Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund), Leuser Management Unit Background: The Leuser Ecosystem covers some 2.6 million hectares: 80 percent of which is in the contested territory of Aceh (now officially called Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam) with the remaining 20 percent in the province of North Sumatra. The area includes Gunung Leuser National Park (800,000 hectares), declared by Presidential Decree (KepPres No.33/1998) as a conservation area. The Leuser Ecosystem has rich natural resources, encompasses several types of ecosystems, and is relatively undisturbed. Its varied ecosystems include beach forests, lowland swamp forests, wetlands, lowla nd rainforests, alpine and mountain forests, along with Mt. Leuser Peak at 3,119 meters above sea level. The biodiversity in this area almost fully represents the biodiversity of Sumatra Island. 129 species of mammals, big and small, out of a total of 205 species in Sumatra have been recorded in this park. The Leuser ecosystem is the habitat of sumatran orang utan (Pongo abelii), sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris), sumatran rhino (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis), tapir (Tapirus indicus), sumatran elephant (Elephas maximus sumatranus), gibbon (Hylobathes lar), leaf monkey (Presbytis thomasii) and many others. Mount Leuser also provides the water supply for millions of people in both provinces (North Sumatra and Aceh). In spite of its rich 1

biodiversity, this conservation area is threatened by illegal logging, which has deforested almost 15 percent of the total area. The Leuser Ecosystem also has tremendous tourism potential with its diversity of plants and animals, its varied ecosystems, its river, beautiful landscapes and cultural diversity. Six potential places have been developed as tourism sites. They are Keudah (the main gateway for climbing Mount Leuser), Lawe Gurah (forest and white water rafting) both in Aceh province, Lau Kawar (camping ground and mountain lake), Tangkahan (forest, river, hot spring and cave), Bahorok (river and orang utan), and Sibolangit (forest), all in North Sumatra province. The Tangkahan Area with its forest resources, river, hot spring, and caves has good potential for tourism development because of its close proximity to Medan, the capital city of North Sumatra Province. However, the area is also under environmental pressure due to illegal logging activity. In 1997, many villagers from Namo Sialang Village were illegal loggers. In order to reduce deforestation, the Leuser Management Unit (UML), in cooperation with Leuser National Park and Indecon, has encouraged the residents from the two villages to take part in ecotourism development activities. The program focused on community development and policy framework development for the community. With participation from community members, the program has succeeded in developing a master plan towards establishing a tourism organization called LPT (Lembaga Pariwisata Tangkahan/Tangkahan Tourism Institution), establishing local policies and a Memorandum of Understanding between park management and the community. The park has granted authority to the community to manage the tourism project, has already settled on entrance fees and established an income distribution system from tourism activities. Objectives: 1. To develop a community based ecotourism enterprise, in order to reduce the rate of forest destruction caused by illegal logging and to generate some alternative income for the Tangkahan community. 2. To assist the community in developing local policies for tourism management. 3. To design and develop ecotourism products, on a participatory basis. 4. To increase the Tangkahan community s capacity to manage ecotourism. Description of the activities: Developing tourism plans and products, building capacity, and developing local policies are the three main programs. Building capacity by empowering the community members is an important way to increase their ecotourism perspectives and knowledge to improve their ability in tourism management. Activities have been conducted through meetings and training programmes which led to the Tangkahan Tourism Institution in May 2001 and it has already provided the area with some qualified managers and guides. An ecotourism master plan was developed through a participatory process in which base-line data compilation, analysis, design and implementation were achieved through a long process in cooperation with the community. These activities produced interpretative trails and the required facilities, material promotions, and a code of ethics for visitors and tour products. The project also assisted and succeeded in developing a guidebook and standard operation procedures for guides. Establishing local policies included recognizing local wisdom and activities, adjusting the zoning system (including limitations on riverbank activities), identifying educational requirements as well as the sharing of benefits. LPT also developed cooperation with NGO s, such as Flora Fauna International (FFI) to manage the Conservation Response Unit (CRU/monitoring system using elephants to prevent illegal logging). Besides its use for monitoring purposes, the system also doubled as a tourism gimmick and the elephant became an attraction for the tourists. 2

Critical Instruments Awareness/capacity building In 2002, the community took some action to prevent outside loggers from entering the forest. In 2003, the monitoring unit captured and punished one villager for using an electrical method for fishing in the river. In local regulations, these activities had been designated as illegal activities. The experience taught national park authorities that communities are able to conserve nature whenever they are assisted and guided in effective ways. Tourism activities in Tangkahan have also reduced forest encroachments and poaching by local people, since most of the tourism activities are also conducted in the forest. Meanwhile, the conservation response unit using the three elephants has shown a positive impact in minimizing illegal logging and poaching. Capacity building programs with participation by the community and National Park staff have produced a wide range of perspectives on ecotourism development. Search and Rescue as well as Interpreter and Conservation Division are the targets of this project. The series of guide training programs (in door and out door training) was entrusted to the Interpreter and Conservation division; they learned how to develop a tourism product, such as developing interpretative trails, identifying points of interest based on traditional knowledge and developing an interpretive story-line for guides. Design, planning and management This project focuses on the importance of community assessment with regards to tourism and the participatory planning process. Through a series of meetings with several sectors of the community and consultations with various stakeholders, the project succeeded in producing a tourism master plan that accommodates community needs and conservation. The park is designated as an extensive zone, where there are no big scale tourism facilities, except for trekking, information and interpretation. Therefore the resulting impact is low. Meanwhile the intensive zone was established at a palm oil plantation area outside of the national park, an area that was given loan land status from PTP II to LPT for an undetermined time span on the condition that it be used by the community for tourism purposes. Their tourism design also succeeded in establishing acceptable zone criteria by taking natural resources and economic development into consideration. Regulatory instruments Park management, as a central government institution under the department of Forestry, also creates policy at the local level. The park delegates the right to the community through LPT to manage the area for ecotourism purposes based on their master plan. The right was granted with the condition that the community should protect the park. The park also issued new pricing policies for entrance and research fees in the Tangkahan area and authorized the LPT to manage it. The regency tourism office also supports the development of this site for tourism purposes by declaring Tangkahan as an ecotourism destination at the Langkat regency. Some new local policy initiatives by government to support community-based tourism are needed. Self-regulation Currently, the community has created local regulations that were approved in Peraturan Desa (Village Regulation) in 2003, based on a combination of local needs and master plan recommendations. New entrance fees were set in conjunction with the national park. Entrance fees and profit distribution were set up in detail. The profit from entrance fees, managed by LPT, is then distributed between two villages, as well as providing a contribution to the other two villages. Policy establishment at village level gives LPT a strong measure of credibility to manage the area. The regular technical meetings are conducted every two weeks along with a monthly evaluation meeting. Meeting proceedings are publicized on an information board, so that, indirectly, other community members can also access information about economic benefits and advantages obtained from LPT. 3

Impacts No. Impact Positive Negative 1 2 3 1 2 3 I Economic 1 Earning supplementary income from tourism 2 Stimulate tourism business 3 Distribution of Benefits II Environmental 1 Enhancement of awareness of the villagers about conservation 2 Increasing the capacity of community for forest conservation 3 Reducing forest encroachment, illegal logging and poaching 4 Waste and garbage management 5 Reducing land expansion, encroachment, and poaching III Social 1 Reducing conflicts between communities 2 Increasing coordination between stakeholders 3 Enhancement of awareness of the government for the community s capacity Note: 1. Villagers point of view 2. Park Officials point of view 3. Reviewers point of view Lessons Learned Community based assessment and ecotourism planning through a participatory process with the local community is an innovative approach by the project. The result is called RIPPDES or Rencana Induk pariwisata Desa or village tourism master plan as the first such tourism master plan arrived at in conjunction with the local people at the village level. The local initiative in establishing LPT as a community institution for tourism development is an important achievement, since 32 of the 55 LPT members were ex-loggers. The membership of LPT increased by 50 percent within 2 years, showing that the spirit and commitment of local people interested in working together to manage ecotourism and benefit from its activities are high. In fact, this community s assistance was needed for several procedures that took a long period of time before this development obtained a positive response from the national park authorities. In 2002, the Head of Gunung Leuser National Park granted the authority for LPT to manage an area of forest in National Park through a Memorandum of Understanding. This MoU became another innovation whereby the national park gave management authority to a community, with the condition that it must protect and conserve the area. The actual area now protected from illegal logging is much larger than the area granted to LPT because the village of Namo Sialang is a frontier village and acts as a main gate to enter the park. This is an indirect advantage to the park management. The MoU between park and the LPT pressured a government-owned plantation to loan nine hectares of its plantation area to LPT for use as a staging area 4

to accommodate a visitor center, handicraft center and parking lots. Conservation and management decisions were translated into village regulations as local policies that are recognized by the government at the village and sub district levels. LPT also built the Information system by locating information boards at strategic places in two villages. This has become an effective way to publicize LPT programs and tourism policies relating to the villagers. Under these positive conditions, the capacity building of the community through an appropriate approach has led to a positive result where the community s efforts in conservation have increased by incorporating the conservation and monitoring units into the organizational structure of LPT. The Monitoring Unit succeeded in apprehending and penalizing community members who utilized dangerous methods in their fishing activities. Once the organization phase was completed, the LPT invited the regency and central governments to promote their ecotourism product. Since then, the number of visitors to Tangkahan has increased by approximately 37 percent both for domestic and foreign visitors. Potential for Application A project designed to focus on local community participation for its tourism plan, local policy development and capacity building has great potential to be replicated in the other national parks of Indonesia. This year, the participative process leading to a tourism plan has already been replicated in other ecotourism projects in Central Java, as well as for local policy developments. Applications of this type might best be applied in areas with similar problems and characteristics, employing mainly the participatory and partnership approach. In cases where national park management grants the opportunity and full authority to manage Tangkahan forests for tourism development as an LPT, that community in return has to protect and conserve the area. In such situations, there is huge potential for this approach to be replicated in other areas. Contact 1. Syukur al Fajar and Saipul Bahri (Lembaga Pariwisata Tangkahan), tangkahan_ecotourism@yahoo.com 2. Mr. Ir. Hart Lamer Susetyo (Head of Gunung Leuser National Park) Jl. Raya Blang Kejeren No. 37, Kuta Cane, Aceh Tenggara. Phone: +62 629 21358; Fax: +62 629 21016 3. Rifky Sungkar, rifkys@yahoo.com References 1. Master Plan of Tangkahan, Unit management Leuser, 2002 2. Leuser: A Sumatran sanctuary, yayasan Bina Sains Hayati, edited by Carel P. van Schaik and Jatna Supriatna Case reviewer: Ary S. Suhandi, arys_2002@yahoo.com, suhandi@indecon.or.id Information date: July-October 2003 5

6 Photo Courtesy by INDECON