Implications of Responsible Tourism for Conservation and Development in Southern Africa - Responsible Tourism: Critical Issues for Conservation and Development - page 350

• Encourage local government scrutiny of joint ventures, cooperatives and

public-private sector partnerships; it may be appropriate for local govern-
ment to assist communities in maintaining some control over the forms of
tourism development in their area.

• Partnerships need to be based on transparency, mutual respect and shared

risk taking, ensuring clarity about roles and expectations.

• Through their supply chain tourism businesses can increase their linkages to

the local economy and to economically poor producers.

• In considering proposals for community-based tourism development, there

needs to be more focus on business planning and administration, consumer
orientated product development, quality, cooperation with the commercial
sector, communication, sales channels, marketing and the management of the
interaction between tourists and local people.

• Care needs to be taken to avoid regulation causing corruption or excluding

small businesses and communities.

• Robust and transparent financial management systems are needed to

empower the community to ensure that earnings are distributed equitably
within the community.

Practitioners have presented evidence from across southern Africa, and systemat-
ically addressed whether tourism can be used as a development tool for
biodiversity conservation and poverty alleviation. Although the contributors have
tended to largely concentrate their efforts on local economic development issues,
the implications of responsible tourism for conservation have also been
addressed. The majority of the contributors have taken a critical and objective
stance in their analyses, and seem to support the actions recommended in the
Kerala Declaration. This topic has, after all, been compiled in an attempt to
disseminate more of the lessons practitioners have learned in southern Africa, as
presented by the people working in the field. It is hoped that their ability to
communicate their understanding of tourism's impacts will assist governments,
development agencies and the private sector in promoting tourism in a more
responsible manner, and in the words of the Cape Town Declaration, for them 'to
take responsibility for achieving sustainable tourism, and to create better places
for people to live in and for people to visit' (Cape Town, 2002).

Notes

1 Friday, 1 July 2005, 1 Botswana Pula = 0.18370 US Dollar

References

Ali, S. H. (ed) (2007) ' Peace Parks: Conservation and Conflict Resolution ', MIT press,
Cambridge, MA and London