BUILD AWARENESS ON THE ECO-TOURISM DEVELOPMENT OF NATURE CONSERVATION AREA IN SOUTHEAST ASIA REGION

by Muhammad Al-Mujabudda'wat

While Indonesia is rich in biodiversity, pressure from its over growing population has caused of loss of habitat and endangered survival of many species. Much of the threat arises from the population’s high dependency on the forest zone. For example, people living around a forest area not only rely on the nomadic farming system and forest produce for their daily livelihood, but also have to compete with a global trade system designed by more developed countries. In Indonesia, thousands of hectares of forests have been converted into plantations, mines, etc., while conservation areas such as national park suffer from intense ilegal lodging. It is inevitable that we, the society, are an inseparable part of the forest ecosystem. If there is no other way to support the community’s life, it is feared that depletion of this nation’s biodiversity will continue. Yet according to many tourism practitioners, this wealth has considerable potential for the development of eco-tourism, a concept of continuous forest management through tourism. But would experimenting with the conservation area’s role and function through lasting utilization pose no risk? As set forth in law number 5 of 1990 on Conservation of Biological Resource and its ecosystem, conservation areas consist of two groups: the natural preservation area (KSA), consisting of natural preserve and animal conservation and nature conservation areas (KPA) consisting of national parks, nature recreation parks, botanical forest parks, and hunting grounds. In addition to the conservations areas, there are protection forests which act to preseve water ecosystem.
Since the end of the second millenium, the international market has shown a growing interest among the inhabitants of this earth for nature based tourism. Where meeting such growing demand is concerned, Indonesia’s wealth of natural resources in both land and sea has a very strong potential for the development of eco-tourist, as a concept of continuous utilization of natural resources through tourism. On the other hand, many people still rely on such natural resources for their livelihood. The people’s dependency on natural resources which are encountered mostly in conservation areas such as National Parks, Nature Recreation Parks, and preservation forest forest areas as well as other conservation areas may pose a threat to such areas.
Until now few conservation areas have developed programs and activities which truly involve the community and are capable of meeting visitor demands. To counter the threat against conservation areas, the community’s concrete role would be a primary requirement for the successful development of eco-tourism in conservation areas. Indonesia is one of the world’s countries with rich natural potential, ranking as a third largest mega biodiversity country after Brazil and Zaire, Its land and waters span 5200 km along the equator and it possesses an abundance of natural beauty and resources, much of them already designated into 385 conservation areas.
Those areas serve not only as a safe for the animals living in them, but also as ‘non-timber’ producers which will be benificial to the community if managed prudently. For developing countries like Indonesia this has gained a special significance since ‘back to nature’ oriented activities throughout the world have evolved into a new method for utilizing natural resources. Moreover, foreign tourists from America, Europe, and Australia with their considerable purchasing power constitute a highly potential market. Given the above two factors, natural resources and the market. Indonesia has a very good opportunity for becoming an eco-tourist destination.
As a resource foundation for human survival, conservation areas play a very important role for the quality of water and air, land and sea, and biodiversity as well as an economic and scientific resource. The conservation area plays an essential role in a region because it can be considered for area development, economic activities and even social cultural actualisation of the local community. This essential role and function of conservation areas is little understood since the areas biodiversity and unique ecosystem are yet to be regarded as an ecosystem unit with a very high ecological, economical, social, and cultural value. Few comprehend that conservation areas should served a role and function for various concurrent interests such as sciene, education, micro/macro scale climate, social aspects, economy, culture, recreation, etc.
An organization’s development in reaching its goal is highly dependent on the quality its human resource. An organization can only realize its function when the human resource contained in it understands the organization’s goal. However, understanding alone will not be enough to create the desired result. The available resource should be equipped with supporting capacity to enable them to perform their rose, either individually in tasks that become their express responsibility, and it roles where they should cooperate with other individuals within the organization. Without cooperation, it will be impossible to achieve a major target, the organization’s goal. In practice, to achieve its goal, the organization can not afford to work alone either, it will have to be capable of cooperation with other organizations or institutions. Eco-tourism can also be defined as tourism which places the environment ahead of foreign exchange revenue. Specifically, therefore, an organization which is engaged in such tourism should at least be capable of understanding two current things, tourism and conservation.
Today, the tourism industry is the new locomotive of economic development, because tourism activities had a potential for rapid growth and Indonesia’s natural beauty was ripe for development as a tourist destination. However, the method that the ‘developmentalists’ adopted in developing tourism so far is oriented at economic activities alone, generating income, creating job opportunities with no regards to social and cultural aspects. This method tends to perceive tourism as a foolproof industry, where a relatively low investment will be capable of kicking in a multiplier effect. Such small investment would draw capital at an increasingly large scale, and generate profits for all parties, from the government receiving income in the form of tax, the entrepreneurs making a profit, to the people who receive job opportunities and income. The community develops cultural products desired by the tourism activity. These products get bought, and the community is perceived to have been paid fairly for them. What is frequently overlooked, however, is that the culture undergoes a depreciation/devaluation due to co modification, which would slowly transform the cultures into a simulacrum (devoid of values). Tourism changes cultural values into a commercial culture, a commodity. This process is not a simple matter of semantic abstraction, shifting values will be followed by shifting institutions, the social functions and roles which can be measured by economic value.
Eco-tourism Concept
Eco-tourism was born in theory and practice out of critism towards mass tourism, which is deemed to destroy it own fundamental resources, environmental and culture. This criticsm resulted in the emergence of several new terms, such as alternative tourism, responsible tourism, community base tourism, and eco-tourism. The common reason for using this concept is because it can illustrate a tourism that; is not a large/mass scale tourism, follows principles of continuity, and promotes international relations. Among these concepts, eco-tourism is considered to be the most popular, partly since it is capable of linking the needs of the environmental movement seeking ways and tools to translate ecological principles into continuous management practices, from the latest market trends such as adventure travel all the way to nature based lifestyle. Therefore, the environmental movements regards this tourism concept as an independent conservation instrument, because; it is capable of financing its own commercial operations, it provides an alternative to exploitation of natural resources by the industry or the local community, and it serves as a community education facility by expanding its movement’s base.
The tourism industry generally understands eco-tourism as a profitable trend and a way to create an image which promotes environmental awareness. Certainly there are many green entrepreneurs who are at the forefront of this conservation business, yet they have usually failed to understand eco-tourism as something more than a (relatively) low impact form of mass tourism. This situation is evident from the formats of sales promotion for travel packages to nature preservation areas known as eco-tourism. This occures because eco-tourism as a concept is most open to different interpretations, depending on who is looking at it, why, and where.
Nevertheless, its progress shows that there are a number of standard criteria on how eco-tourism should be:
1. Environment preserving. If eco-tourism is not a conservation instrument, then its resource foundation will be destroyed.
2. Lucrative. If it is not, there will be no capital return for conservation, nor will there be any incentive for alternative resource utilization.
3. Beneficial to the local community.
Eco-tourism as a New Tourism Paradigm
Tourism has also managed to bridge the gap between visitor and destination. Classic tourism is interpreted as a holiday, seeing famous places, exotic culture, beautiful nature, or simply rest and relaxation, enjoying special treatment from world class hotels and cruise ships. Classic tourism still does exist, but modern tourism has created a hard to classify phenomenon. For example, Ubud in Bali has not only become a post modern global village, but also a post modern paradigm as translated into an attitude, lifestyle, philosophy as is the case of names like Latin Quarter, Rivera or Carnaby street, which are perceived as more than places name. They have turned into cultural concepts after tourism has integrated them into its teritory.
Likewise, eco-tourism has become an ecological concept. In its discourse, it has managed to bridge the gap between visitor and tourist destination, operator and environment, into a vision of conservation as global movement by mutual agreement between stakeholders who cooperate in order to achieve a common foundation. In this case, eco-tourism will reflect a new paradigm of continuous development, which avoids dominance of any particular sector over another. This should certainly occur without prejudicing the importance of economy, but rather by trying to connect it proportionally to other factors in the system. ‘Sustainability’ is an effort to place value over system and a relationship based on mutual dependency (such as host-guest or eco-tourist environment relationship) over substance (such as material luxury), and system (between players and stakeholders) over individual parts. Eco-tourism shoulders the burden of synchronicity among the parts which make up one working system.
Tourism and Environmental Best Practices in 4 (Four) ASEAN Member
1. Kinabalu Park, Sabah, Malaysia
Malaysia’s forest are indisputability the oldest in the world and its National Park are treasure troves of its rich natural heritage. The Kinabalu Park is one of the greatest attractions of Sabah. Kinabalu consisting of Mt. Kinabalu (4,101 m) and the Kinabalu Park is one of the twelve destinations that are promoted internationally. Kinabalu offers the natural lovers a complete ecological system compact in one small area. Within the boundaries of the 712 km² Kinabalu Park are found the lowland rain forest of the tropical zone at its lower level, the montana oaks and fig trees, the rhododendron shrubs and wild berries of the temperate zone at its medium level and the conifers and other alpine line associations of the summits zone at its upper level. The Kinabalu Park is known for the abundance and diversity of its plant life within one of the most ancient vegetation in the world. Mt. Kinabalu is a place with significance in the folklore of the local Dusun Kadazan people. Plants growing there provide natural products such as rattans, foods, and furnishing material.
The Kinabalu Park, apart from offering its rare flora and fauna has adopted many best practices of sustainable tourism development. These range from meeting the various needs of the interest groups, community benefits, research, visitor dispersal, information, to committed long service staff. The management and operation of Kinabalu Park is generally consistent with the 18 articles of the Charter for Sustaibnable Tourism, adopted by the Sustainable Tourism World Conference (organised by WTO) in the Canary Islands in 1995.
2. Sungei Buloh Nature Park, Singapore
Sungei Buloh National Park was designated a wild bird reserve and nature park for mangrove flora and fauna in 1989. It is the first of its kind to be established in Singapore. The Nature Park has a wide range of habitat mangroves, woodlands, fresh water ponds, and the extensive mudflats. Lying directly along the important East Asian Flyway for migratory shorebirds, its wide range of habitat provides a major stop over feeding ground for these migratory birds. Being one of the riches shorebirds sites in Singapore and its accessibillity, Sungei Buloh Nature Park has attracted visitors both locally and from abroad. Since 1989 the park has come a long way, from an abandoned unmanaged site that was eamarked for development to a nature park, home for many local birds as well as migratory birds. The cumulative number of bird species has increased from 126 in 1989 to 175 in 1994. The 80,000 visitors to this unique park allow them to enjoy the natural environment and have a greater awareness and responsibility toward the environment.
3. Archaeological Sites, Ban Prasat, Thailand
Primary survey of this site and test excavations were conducted in 1983 and the following year. Meanwhile on July 15 1983, the Ministry of Education made an announcement that declared the following restricted areas in Nakon Ratchasima Province as National treasured sites according to the Ancient Monument, Antiquities and Museum act 1961. In the 1991 fiscal year, the site is included in the Tourist Promotion Development Plan of the Northeast Region. Budget was provided for excavations, which designed not only to reveal the past information of the site but also to present it in the form of open site museum, where the evidence was scientifically conserved in site. In this way the visitors may enjoy the site by using their self experience in understanding and interpreting the way of life in the past.
During October 12-17, 1994, a home stay programme as part of youth travel to Ban Prasat was planned. The youth spent the night of October 15 1994 with the villagers so that they would experience and learn for themselves the North-eastern everyday life, tradition, and culture and thus consciousness would be implanted in their minds to conserve and protect the local heritage. This enabled them to gain precise knowledge and understanding of the local lifestyle. Large number of Thais and foreigners visit ban Prasat each day. The site from now on will stand as a tourism asset of great archaeological importance of the Northeast. Life at Ban Prasat is still perfectly peaceful and simple. It is all Thai people’s responsibillity to conserve their national heritage and join hands in supporting the Thai Culture Promotion Year 1994. Lastly, Ban Prasat received the ASEANTA Awards for Excellence in Tourism in 1996 for being The Best ASEAN Cultural Preservation Effort.
4. The Heritage Town of Vigan, Philipines
Historic Vigan is the capital town of the Province of Ilocos Sur. It is situated along the north western coast of the island of Luzon in the northern Philipines. The Municipality of Vigan has a total land areas of 2.74 km², 60% of which are agricultural lands. Like most city in Asia, urban centre in Philipines are fast losing their identity and character with the proliferation of high raise structure copied from western architecture. Instruction of irreplaceable heritage properties continues unabated to satisfy the demand of growing economy. Now that the tourism is ground into the world’s largest industry and has proven to be realible source of revenue communities are in a frenzy to preserve whatever is left of their bulit heritage.
In the case of Vigan, the historic urban fabric has been well preserve and is ‘alive’ the development of sustainable tourism industry is possible, because of the following factors; a strong public private partnership in heritage tourism development, the current administration’s development thrust to spur economic growth trough of traditional trade, crafts and industries, and the conservation of cultural and natural heritage to attract tourist, All stakeholders are working against time to resolve differences between economic development and conservation.





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