Ecotourism in Madagascar - Responsible Tourism: Critical Issues for Conservation and Development - page 20

• CNRO: a hotel school prioject application is awaiting approval by the

Minister of Education;

• Tourism Land Reserve of Sakatia: a request for proposals is being revised by

the Economic Development Board of Madagascar; and

• Evatra Lokaro: a part of the land is going through a new delimitation process.

A new national vision to develop tourism with a focus on the environment,
'Madagascar - naturally ' was publicly announced by the President in February
2006. This was followed by the Madagascar Action Plan (MAP) 4 in November
2006, which sets out the government's political goals until 2012. Looking at the
sections on the environment, the MAP outlines two major strategies:

1 Ensure environmental sustainability by adopting strategies for sustainable

development and the protection of natural resources.

2 Use resources intelligently and productively: 'We need to minimize the loss

and maximize the gain to assure an intelligent and productive use of the
nation's resources' (MAP, 2006, p11).

To adopt and implement these two main strategies into practice, eight recommen-
dations were identified, including concrete objectives and indicators. Ecotourism
has been included in two of the eight MAP recommendations (see the appendix).
These recommendations give a better understanding of changes the government
foresees until 2012 (MAP, 2006, 93ff). Some of the important recommendations
related to ecotourism are mentioned below:

• Identify and launch new tourist sites and products.

• Promote the destination 'Madagascar' as a superior and unique ecotourism

destination.

• Establish a national ecotourism framework and strategy to contribute to the

protection and promotion of the environment and to ensure 'eco-eco' harmo-
nization (economic-ecological).

• Establish an Ecotourism policy, charter, code that states the vision, the

commitment, the values and the approach for the promotion and implemen-
tation of ecotourism throughout the country.

• Establish special zones for ecotourism.

The new national vision presented by the President was followed by further activ-
ities at the national, regional and institutional level, including a workshop at the
national level entitled 'Assises Nationales sur le Tourisme Durable', in November
2006. Four objectives were given to the participants to discuss and propose
actions to improve the situation:

1 improve the management synergies of the acting partners;

2 better integration of the sector into the decentralization programme of the

government (strengthen the regional tourism departments to deal with