‘Namibia might not have brought home the Tourism for Tomorrow Award, but we are all winners’ – Maxi Louis, Secretariat Coordinator, NACSO.
The Global Travel and Tourism Summit of the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) was held in China’s capital, Beijing, last week. Around 1,500 delegates from all over the world attended the summit and included many of the industry’s leaders from around the globe.
A small Namibian delegation was invited to attend the summit, because Namibia’s Communal Conservancy Tourism Sector had been selected as one of three finalists in the Community Benefit category out of 53 entries from around the world. The Namibian delegation consisted of Maxi Louis (NACSO), Helge Denker (NACSO/WWF In Namibia) and Helga Owoses (≠Khoadi- //Hôas Conservancy). The group was supported in Beijing by representatives of the Embassy of Namibian in China and had the full backing of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism at home.
A highlight of the summit, especially for Namibia, was the Tourism for Tomorrow Awards Ceremony, held as part of the prestigious Gala Dinner at Beijing’s famous National Centre for the Performing Arts. The Centre is certainly an awe-inspiring venue and underlined the tremendous recognition the Tourism for Tomorrow Awards earn. Namibia was there, rubbing shoulders with the elite of the travel and tourism industry, proudly represented by Maxi and her colleagues.
Namibia’s innovative Communal Conservancy Tourism Sector received a great deal of interest and praise throughout the summit. Many of the delegates at the summit were convinced that Namibia should win the Community Benefit Award. The Award recognises ‘a tourism initiative that has effectively demonstrated direct benefits to local people, including capacity building, the transfer of industry skills, and support for community development’.
Namibia’s programme actually goes beyond community benefits. It meets all the criteria for tourism for tomorrow – it is sustainable; it achieves large scale conservation goals while at the same time providing significant community benefits; it is both a rural development and conservation programme. It is people living with and benefiting from wildlife and managing their environment in a sustainable way. And it provides visitors with the opportunity to participate and to experience a truly authentic product. It really is tourism for tomorrow, today.
There are currently 59 registered communal conservancies in Namibia, covering over 16% of the country and embracing one in four rural Namibians. Within these conservancies, 31 joint venture agreements are operational, facilitating direct community benefits. Joint-venture tourism generated close to N$ 17 million in benefits to participating communities in 2008. Quite a number of additional joint-venture agreements are in the process of finalisation, while many new conservancies are still being formed. Conservancies have facilitated the large scale recovery of wildlife in many communal areas, including large predators and rare, high value species such as the endangered black rhino.
The Namibian delegates spent a lot of time with their fellow nominees, learning about other great initiatives from other parts of the world. New Zealand’s whale watching initiative, which has been benefiting the local Maori community for over two decades, was able to share many of the challenges and successes that Namibia has been dealing with. It was great to compare similar experiences from such different environments and positive to see Whale Watch Kaikoura win the Community Benefit Award.
Our neighbour, Botswana, was nominated as a finalist in the Destination Stewardship Award, while Wilderness Safaris, one of our strongest private sector partners here in Namibia as well as one of the most important responsible tourism operators in Southern Africa, was nominated as a finalists in the Global Tourism Business Award. Such strong regional representation made us all very proud.
The awards are handed out annually, and it may have been too ambitious to hope for three winners out of four categories from Southern Africa. We congratulate Botswana for winning the Destination Stewardship Award and know that Wilderness Safaris would be just as deserving a winner in Global Tourism Business as Accor, the winner of this category.
In fact, we believe that we are all winners. We are winners because we were there, sharing the spotlight with all our fellow nominees at the most prestigious event in the travel and tourism industry.
We are winners because our work is first and foremost about what is achieved on the ground, in the field, amongst the people. We know that we are winning here. A nomination as finalist is international recognition of such achievement.
We are all winners, because the success of our sector is based on strong partnerships between communities, the private sector, NGOs and government – all of whom benefit from the partnership and facilitate its ongoing success.
We are winners, because we are practicing tourism for tomorrow, today.
THE WINNERS: Community Benefit Award: • Whale Watch Kaikoura, New Zealand
