Ecotourism in Madagascar - Responsible Tourism: Critical Issues for Conservation and Development - page 30

dation in whichever category they like, but not necessarily in the category that
matches reality. This is why much accommodation is wrongly classified or not
classified at all. It is hoped that the new classification system follows established
international criteria and environmental and social issues will be integrated, cover-
ing the whole of Madagascar's hotel and lodge business.
Between 2006 and 2007, the President was supported by an 'ecotourism
advisor' as a result of the movie 'Madagascar'. In exchange for using the name
'Madagascar', DreamWorks Corporation made a donation to Conservation
International and the advisory position was created. Thanks to the advisor's work,
ecotourism issues have been largely integrated into the MAP (commitment 7).
The announcement of the MAP as government strategy has resulted in
several regional workshops on how to tackle its demands up to 2012.The environ-
mental strategy plan has been reviewed and has been brought in line with this new
overall government strategy. The Office National for Environment (ONE) has
implemented a green label (Label vert). The indicators used have been largely
copied from Australia's National Ecotourism Accreditation Program (NEAP) and
are therefore difficult to adopt to Malagasy reality (e.g. the recycling of waste is
currently very unusual in Madagascar). This might be the reason why the ONE
label is currently not well known or adopted by the hotel industry. Nevertheless, it
is a good step towards sensitizing hotel operators and to increasing the competi-
tive environment at the same time. One of the propositions of the Assises
Nationales and Ecotod was to implement a so-called 'sustainability label', includ-
ing not only environmental but also socio-cultural, economic, quality and service
aspects, based on the new hotel classification. Seen at the international level,
Madagascar would be one of the first countries to group these important aspects
for sustainable tourism development into one label.
Ecotod has revised the MAP for ecotourism issues and presented a
'MAP/Ecotod Report' to the Minister. This report presents practical implementa-
tion guidelines underlined by a development strategy, action plan, best practice
examples, indicators, budget allocation and a time frame. It took into account the
already existing plans (e.g. the masterplan) and efforts (e.g. Assises Nationale sur
le Tourisme Durable, Ecotod's proper programme), and also used the Local
Agenda 21 for the Travel and Tourism Industry as a base for its own framework
and as a link to international development efforts for sustainable tourism
(Pawliczek, 2006b).
Together with the main Malagasy tourist associations, Ecotod's members
have developed the first Malagasy Sustainable Tourism Codes of Conduct for the
different stakeholders in tourism. The material for the codes, namely for hotels
and restaurants, tour and transport operators, visitors as well as the local popula-
tion, were based on the experiences and data derived from the earlier
development of an ecotourism definition for Madagascar. To keep this definition
short, there has been an agreement to explain several aspects further using these
codes. The codes are structured using the three aspects of sustainability (environ-
ment, socio-cultural and economic) and give practical advice that can be easily
followed.