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development project
Making Debretabor-Meqdela spot of tourist attraction Dr.
Mulugeta Feseha, Dean of the College of Development Studies (CDS) at the
Addis Ababa University and the principal investigator of the
Debretabor-Meqdela community-based eco-tourism development project, recently
gave an interview to Walta Information Center (WIC) about the identification
and mapping of the Debretabor-Meqdela chain of tourist resources. CDS, which
formerly studied the Adwa community based ecotourism sites, is now also
actively working with the community and other stakeholders to spot and
Q: What are the major objectives of the Debretabor-Meqdela community-based ecotourism development project? A: The general objectives of the Debretabor-Meqdela community-based eco-tourism development project is exploring the landscape, geological, archaeological, historical and cultural tourism resources; create public awareness on ecotourism through enhancing community participation for empowerment and equitable benefit sharing; prepare plan for development of eco-tourism in collaboration with the Amhara Culture and Tourism Bureau, through community participation and within the framework of maximizing community benefits; create sustainable eco-tourism schemes in the area; and finally develop a pilot research-template for similar tourism resources in other places of the Amhara Region.
In addition, the research activity has specific objective including locating and delineating the first cannon production site in Ethiopia, at Gafat, and select sites for setup of descriptive billboards; studying the historical strategic military route of Emperor Tewodros from Debretabor (Gafat) to the battlefield of Mekdela and identify and mark tourist stops and billboard sites; study special traditional and cultural tourist attraction sites from Gafat to Meqdela; study the geology and landscape from Gafat to Meqdela and select special scenic areas for tourist stops, camping and ecolodge sites; study the positions and alignments of the Ethiopian and British military during the battle at Meqdela and propose artistic demonstration of the war and annual war-reactivation; as well as study the processes of integrating ecotourism and sustainable environmental resources utilization. Moreover, it is planned to set up billboards that describe the cannon production site, all relevant historical sites from Gafat to Meqdela, scenery sites, camping and ecolodge sites. Preparing a proposal for a National Museum that will house the rich armament and historical documents of Emperor Tewodros at Meqdela; and a landmark for Fetewrari Gebeyehu’s burial site as well as conducting the economic analysis of community based ecotourism development at Mekedela are part of the research work.
Q: What is the rationale to develop the tourist sites for community- based ecotourism? A: Firstly, we have unique historical places such as the battle of Meqdela and Metema, and the Ethiopian heroes Emperor Tewodros and Yohannes have unique historical significance in the national history, i.e., they have defended their nation at all costs including the emperors’ life. Had it not been for such kinds of sacrifices, Ethiopia would have been overrun by the technologically more advanced foreign invaders. Ethiopia should honor selfless heroes and Martyrs and their historical accomplishments. Secondly, the nation is endowed with magnificent scenery and landscape that can easily develop into tourist attraction sites. Thirdly, by transforming the resources associated with history, archaeology, and natural beauty one could make use of these resources to contribute towards economic development through promoting community based ecotourism.
Q: What are the activities so far accomplished by the research team? A: As part of the first phase of the research activity the team has conducted basic and action research on geology, history, archeology, wildlife and forest resources, and economic analysis of tourism resources; is in the processes of producing maps and itineraries of the tourist sites, identified enroute, tourist stop, scenery, camping, ecology sites so far. The study team has also identified historical and cultural spots and routes including archaeological, geological tourist sites, landscape that are potential tourist destinations along the Debretabor-Mekdela as well as Chilga and even dawn to the Metema routes.
Q: What about the activities to be carried out in the future? A: And in phase II tour guide and tour operators training manual will be prepared. Moreover, guides and tour operators on the geology, history, archaeology, map of the area, and on ecotourism services would be trained and tourist guide manual would be developed as well. Activities such as training the community and awareness creation on ecotourism and ecotourism services in areas along the line of tourist tracking paths and tourist stops, setting up 12 billboards in various spots, establishing and capacity building of community based ecotourism offices/desks at appropriate levels, establish learning and practice sharing platforms and proposing local governance structure, promotion work of the site at national and international level, and official launching of eco-tourism development will also be carried out in phase III. An international conference and panel discussions with representatives of the society, the government, NGOs and other stakeholders will be held between May 29-30, 2009 to further develop the ideas of the project in Meqdela. He has strongly appreciated the support and encouragement the Bureau of the Culture and Tourism of the Amhara National Regional State is providing to the project and he further urged all concerned bodies to join hands to the realization of the Adwa and Debretabor-Mekdela eco tourism projects.
Q: What about the potential economic activities that would benefit the community in the tourist sites? A: the study and development of the tourist sites would economically benefit communities around the newly identified tourist sites like: the community can simulate and demonstrate the Battle of Meqdela by representing the British and the Ethiopian armies and heroes and make annual celebration festival; through establishing ecolodges and camping sites of the grand view and scenery sites; through offering ecotourism services; renting car and pack animals; guiding and tour operating services; cultural shows; catering services and through providing agricultural inputs. Here it should be clear that there be a good bargain between the different stakeholders and we are talking about community based and environmentally friendly tourism. They make sure that in the plat form there would be a win-win strategy among all the keholders. Q: What does your involvement currently like in the Adwa eco-tourism sites? A: Our involvement in Adwa:---- actually one thing that has to be very clear here is that as researchers we have our own role as citizens and as responsible educated Ethiopians. As I mentioned earlier, we have the biggest share in scientific tourism resource mapping and we have the bigger share in terms of bridging the research output to implementation. But when it comes to the actual implementation, there is a proper mandated government institution, the tourism and culture bureau, agency or commission. So, we have done the two phases successfully in Adwa, and when it comes to the third phase (the implementation phase) probably you know when an academician has an idea there is some time required to assimilate the new idea on tourism resource mapping, implementation and on the anticipated tourism governance structure. We are hoping that at some point a need would arise and there would be a full implementation of the research out put, but we never expect that it should happen in shorter period of time. So, actually, we were there last November because we had to do a lot of exploration works and we had to check on the status of the need. This was the template that we started there, it took us a while, we did all the ground work for the landmark issue and entrepreneur work in the region but the question is a lot of triangulation works remain to be done. When there is a call for implementation, all the bigger parts like the researchers, the government institutions, NGO, Private sector and the community need to sit together to discuss. But this is not a simple work, even though the major part of the entry point is done; also the attention and appreciation given by the region so far is not much.
Q: It requires a huge amount of money to do that. Do you think that it will be realized very soon? A: Our assumption, actually is that it doesn’t need much money to start community based ecotourism development in Adwa. One thing really amazing is that when it comes to utilizing our tourism resources, it needs proper resource data basing by the existing skilled manpower to understand what exists; present the output to all stakeholders, and when the idea is owned you work together towards implementation. And when it comes to Adwa all the tourism stop sites are accessible, there is no need of rebuilding a road; they are accessible by car and pack animals and on foot, bill boards are set in nine sites, tour guides are trained all is in place and it doesn’t need any investment, you just need to promote and start!
Q: What can you say about the process of erecting land mark in historical sites of Adwa and the involvement of the community? A: In that regard, I don’t know much , when scientists conduct research and come up with an output, then entrepreneurs come and they calculate what they need and what it costs. I do know some information about this step but I don’t know much. This is the responsibility of the entrepreneur; what it costs, and what it benefits. But in our case as researchers we have to make sure that all tourism related activities be done with out harming the environment and try to develop training packages to the community and propose ideas on how the community can benefit from micro finance system to start sustainable ecotourism services. As a starting point there was a proposal that we made: there could be an arrangement between the private sector and the community and the government where for example the tour operators can get 70 per cent of the benefit for three to six months and the government and the community can take a small portion, within that six months enough promotion can be made about the site. From that on the community can start to stand by itself and can make different arrangements with tour agents and can benefit from the tourism business which already is promoted. So, many different options can be proposed to start without much finance. As researchers, whether it is in Adwa, or Amhara, or in Afar our work is to state with broad scientific perspective, with minimum success but making sure that we are heading in the right direction. In general, in our hypothesis we don’t see much of financial burden required but it needs serious discussion and working together. If that happens, for sure we need very minimal cost and Adwa tourism business can be started right away.
Q: Coming to Debre-Tabor-Mekidela, do you think that it would be materialize very soon?
A: Well, as far as I’m concerned, the commitment of the Culture and Tourism Bureau of the Amhara National Regional State is very high, had that not been the case, we could have really started to frustrate by this time because four years of research work with no or minimal impact and with minimal incentives could have been a challenge, even though we always love our work. When it comes to the Amhara regional State, the commitment is so high and so far all the logistic is done by the region in way by the culture and Tourism Bureau in particular and in terms of coordinating other universities from regions, Gonder University, for example, was fully participating with us that was coordinated by the Amhara the culture and Tourism Bureau and the conference is again sponsored by the culture and tourism bureau and all the research work was fully supported by culture and Tourism bureau. Q So, what will be the next step to be taken? A: In terms of Debre Tabor-Meqdela, we are going to have the international conference on community based eco-tourism in Ethiopia from May 29-30, 2009. The objective is to disseminate our research output on the Debretabour-Meqdela community based ecotourism development, and to get feed back and then to polish our final out put and make it ready for implementation. Following that we would produce tour guide manual, bill boards, help in the training of the community and hopefully, in sometime, we would help in getting it fully implemented. And again, once this part is owned by the culture and Tourism office of the Amhara National Regional State and our move would continue because we want to continue research work at national level. For this, we have some how felt that there is a need of critical mass of trained manpower and we have designed a MA curriculum Tourism and Development at the College of Development Studies to be launched in September 2009. The idea is to train as many students as possible at MA level probably from different sectors within the country. And with these critical mass, we want to get support to conduct more research and to train students at graduate and undergraduate levels. In a way we want to be a sort of spring board at national level. We hope that in shorter time, we will be capable in utilizing our natural and cultural tourism resources to really bring good national income through tourism. Last Updated ( Wednesday, 20 May 2009 ) |
