ecoclub.com/blogs - news & views from ecoclub.com members

Jashan-e-Qaqlasht 2009 Celebrated

The people of northern Chitral celebrated Jashan-e-Qaqlasht, the traditional festival, from April 24-27. The commuinities around the Qaqlasht plateatu participated with great enthusiams. Aga Khan Rural Support Programme, Sarhad Tourism Corporation and Chitral Association for Mountain Area Tourism sponsored the event through joint venture. The festival consisted of cultural and sporting events. The sporting events were: traditional free style polo, tug of war, football, vollyball, shot putt, marksmanship with muzzle-loader gun, paragliding and marathon race and so on. The cultural activities included day and night musical programmes, poetry session, school speesh contests and the like.The major objective of the festival is to promote tourism related enterprises and business opportunities beside providing entertainment and affording enabling environment to the local communities particularly youngsters so that in the field of sport and culture they will be able to perform in a better manner.

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Seminar in New York: Culinary Adventures in Crete

Culinary Adventures in CreteKellari Taverna, 19 W 44th St, New York, NYMay 12, 7:00 PMJoin Nikki Rose of Crete's Culinary Sanctuaries, an internationally acclaimed educational program, in celebrating Greece's cultural and culinary heritage.Discover the bounties of Greece during presentations by Chef Rose, Chef Gregory Zapantis of Kellari Taverna and Konstantine Drougos of Wonderful Ethnic Wines. We’ll enjoy a delectable dinner featuring our favorite Cretan and Greek dishes paired with excellent Greek wines.$85 per person. Proceeds go to the CCS documentary project. This program is limited to 50 attendees. Advance registration is required. For more information contact Nikki Rose: info[at]cookingincrete.comCrete's Culinary Sanctuaries Eco-Agritourism Networkcookingincrete.com

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Global Warming-its impacts on the Hindukush region

Global warming is a real discomforting phenomenon with measurable negative impacts for the less developed and remote regions of the world like Chitral, northern Pakistan. Climatic changes experienced by Chitrali locals in recent years have affected villages and brought about ˜alluvial fans [fan-shaped deposits of water-transported material]. Recently, the village of Sonoghor was engulfed by an enormous mud slide caused by a glacier breaking up and wiping out 100 households. Most believe the catastrophe to be linked to the effects of global warming which has extended its tentacles to remote and unspoiled regions like Chitral. The glacier melted and thinned the walls around the many water reservoirs on the glacier which, in turn, melted given the increase in temperatures.Another incident occurred following an unexpected avalanche at Washeej village in the Torkhow valley, destroying many households and killing 50 people. The incident is also linked to global warming.To counter natural calamities like these, an awareness campaign needs to be mounted among Chitrali locals, disseminated by environmental, ecological education and research. There is a saying in Khowar language ‘nadanioche kani baraba’, [ignorance and blindness are the same]. We can cure our social blindness and raise awareness for the protection of our environment only...

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Crete: Responsible Tourism Implementation Workshop

Crete’s Culinary Sanctuaries WorkshopImplementation of Responsible Tourism by Rural CommunitiesOn-site presentations by project directors in Crete, GreeceOctober 11-18, 2009Designed for current and future Responsible Travel practitioners, the media and researchersPresented by the CCS network of residents practicing community-based tourism, organic agriculture and cultural and natural heritage preservation. CCS is internationally acclaimed for best practices in Responsible Travel.Travel with CCS to historic and natural sites, rural communities, organic farms and tavernas for an overview of how communities collaborate on responsible travel programs. People actively involved in sustainable living practices will cover real-world issues that will help workshop attendees create their own programs or share their findings.Locations, On-Site Meetings with the CCS Network, Examples of Mass Tourism and Alternatives:North-Central Coast: Historic Sites, Organic Winemaking, Traditional Cuisine, Small-Scale Lodging, Building Restoration, Mass Tourism, DevelopmentCentral Mountains: Nature-Based Tourism, Cultural Heritage Preservation, Traditional Agricultural Practices, Artisan Food ProductionNorthwestern Coast: Mass Tourism, Small-Scale Enterprises, FisheriesWestern Mountains: Community-Based Tourism; Organic Olive Oil Production; EcolodgingThis program is limited to 12 attendees. Fees: Euros 2,400; US$ 3,200 per person, includes seminar presentations, professional and specialist compensation, scheduled meals and tastings, lodging (private room with private bath), scheduled ground transportation. Contact Nikki RoseFounder & Director, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

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Milking The Rhino

I had the opportunity recently to see the documentary, Milking The Rhino. The film provides an interesting and hopeful look at community-based conservation and tourism in Kenya and Namibia.The film will air today on PBS so tune in if you can.There will be a teacher's edition of the film available shortly. I think it would be a great addition for teacher's of ecotourism and I plan to include it in my spring Adventure Tourism class.To learn more, visit www.milkingtherhino.org.CarolP.S. My spring newsletter is now online. To read about other ecotourism news and events, please go to www.kalahari-online.com/spr09.pdf

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A Chef's Role in Sustainable Initiatives

Greetings,It's great to have an opportunity to discuss the diminishing quality of our food sources and a chef's integral role in supporting sustainable foodways. As well-informed spokespeople about the crucial issues impacting our safe food sources, chefs can and should play an important role in conveying the problems to the local and global community and devise ways to collaborate on solutions.I began working Greece 11 years ago on educational programs that linked visitors with traditional chefs, bakers, fishers, shepherds-cheesemakers, organic farmers, olive oil and wine producers. They share their invaluable knowledge about centuries-old sustainable living practices, their culture and excellent cuisine. In return, we pay our teachers well for their time and expertise. We benefit from a great learning experience and our teachers benefit from our support to carry on their traditional trades that are fast disappearing. Back in 1998, we did not call our work *green* but considered it to be common sense. By linking the global community with local communities that are actively involved in sustainable living practices -- including organic agriculture and sustainable tourism, chefs have a unique opportunity to present big-picture issues and work together on solutions. The key is to provide concrete support to the people...

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green's house effects

As the old adage goes tourism is like fire, it can cook your food, or it can burn your house down.But it was not tourism, but probably pro-mining interests, that burned down the house of eco activist Stefanos Kollias in the village of Kaloskopi in the Mt Giona area of Central Greece, on Sunday night (March 30). Kollias, originally from Athens, has been campaigning against the further expansion of bauxite mining in this largely pristine area. A few days ago he had tried to legally block an environmental impact assessment study conducted for a large mining company. This is the second time in recent months his house is set on fire. A campaign is underway to rebuild his house see here for details (in Greek)while protests are also planned.Next time you think of consuming a multinational soft drink or beer packaged in an aluminium can, remember that it is created and transported through a process which probably involved a lot of human and environmental misery. Not to mention that it (aluminium, not beer of course) may have various adverse health effects.

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Share Your Travel Stories and Win

It's been a long winter in North America. To help ease people into spring, Kalahari Management is launching a contest that will have you remembering happier (and possibly warmer) times.Readers are invited to share their travel stories on our forum at www.reinventuretravel.com/forum They can be funny, heart-warming, quirky or thought-provoking.Our illustrious panel of judges (bribed by free beer and pizza ) will pick the best story posted during April and May.The winner will receive a complementary copy of Reinventure: How Travel Adventure Can Change Your Life by Carol Patterson and Saving Paradise: The Story of Sukau Rainforest Lodge by Albert Teo and Carol Patterson.I look forward to reading your travel talesCarol

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What does CAMAT do for ecotourism?

CAMAT was established in 1998 by a wide spectrum of tourism stakeholders for the promotion of ecotourism in Chitral and Northern Areas. It is not-for-profit registered tourism company. The objective of the association is to diversify people’s livelihood opportunities by creating off-farm job opportunities so that pressure on land resources will decrease and natural biodiversity and ecology will restore. From 2003-7, CAMAT worked through the financial and technical support of UNESCO with a project titled ‘promotion of ecotourism in the mountainous region of Central and South Asia’. The project had eight partners from Central and South Asia. In Pakistan the project rested with CAMAT, which implemented the activities under the following themes to achieve the project's broader objectives: Protection of traditional cultureProtection of natural environmentCapacity buildingNetwork buildingAdvocacy campaign Though UNESCO project came to an end, CAMAT is continuing its activities mostly by the voluntary support of its Board of Directors and cultural groups and natural club throughout the Chitral district. We would like the like-minded NGOs around the world to come forward and support CAMAT in its efforts to protect the virgin natural environment and traditional culture of both the Kalash and Khow communities. CAMAT’s BoD and the Kalash and Khow...

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Ecotourism in the Time of Crisis

(Editorial in Issue 100 of ECOCLUB, International Ecotourism Magazine) QUOTE“The economic anarchy of capitalist society as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of the evil. We see before us a huge community of producers the members of which are unceasingly striving to deprive each other of the fruits of their collective labor—not by force, but on the whole in faithful compliance with legally established rules” – Albert Einstein, Why Socialism? , Monthly Review, May 1949 No one really knows how long this latest systemic crisis may last or how it will end - hopefully not in tears, not like the 1929 one. But it does present a unique opportunity: it can help reveal the resilience and the necessity of small-scale, sustainable tourism, family & community-owned, and prove the unsustainability of mega-resorts, in particular all-inclusive, condo hotels and golf, the funders of which are getting weaker by the day! Within Ecotourism as well, we need to move away from discredited neoliberal recipes, dependencies on aid and other agencies, nefarious mushups like corporate social responsibility, triple bottom lines and carbon offsetting. As Murray Bookchin pointed out “we live in a highly cooptative society that is only too eager to...

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