Prime minister Lyonchhoen Jigmi Y. Thinley has a grand plan for the nomads of Bhutan. While all the 205 gewogs would be connected with roads, the plan is to deliberately leave these places out.
This, the Lyonchhoen reasons, would benefit the communities in the mountains more. The idea is to develop these far-flung places through tourism. The method, by saving them for trekkers and not tourist who would, for instance, drive to Merak or Sakteng and return to Trashigang for night halt.
The idea sounds good. With the country poised to liberalize tourism and bring in 100,000 tourists in the next 2 years, the benefit from the industry should trickle down even to yak herders. The number of tourists visiting Bhutan is rapidly picking up. At local festivals tourists are actually outnumbering locals. And with tourists encountering more tourists, some are even complaining of Bhutan no longer being the exotic country or the last Shangrila they have been told of. Many tourists want to see real Bhutan, away from places like Thimphu and Paro.
In the next two years, we will see the crowd becoming bigger as Bhutan chases its 100,000 tourists target. It is in this light, the Lyonchhoen’s idea will work. People of Merak and Sakteng will only benefit if tourists visit them. The benefit to the community will start coming only when communities are involved. It will start coming if we have community based or for that matter, village based tourism.
If there is one section of Bhutanese who should benefit from tourism, it is the Layaps, the Merakpas and the Saktengpas whose photographs, blown up on the front pages of travel magazines and brochures attract tourists to Bhutan. The returns they get are nothing compared with the contribution they make in marketing Bhutan as an exotic tourist destination.
At the same time it is not only tourism that could benefit Merak or Sakteng. While the Lyonchhoen’s idea sounds good, what about the people of Sakteng? Is it also their idea to not have a road to their village? Some argue that it sounds like a plan to keep Merak and Sakteng a living museum, away from mainstream development, to satisfy the urges of tourists looking for the out of the world experience. The economic benefits to them could come more from road access than the seasonal tourists. How the yak herders of Merak and Sakteng feel is not known.
The debate on Merak and Sakteng’s road access applies to Bhutan as a whole as it markets itself as an exclusive destination Tourism will be an important source of revenue and employment for the country but does it mean that tourism should decide how we develop?
Saving Bhutan for Tourism?
Prime minister Lyonchhoen Jigmi Y. Thinley has a grand plan for the nomads of Bhutan. While all the 205 gewogs would be connected with roads, the plan is to deliberately leave these places out.
This, the Lyonchhoen reasons, would benefit the communities in the mountains more. The idea is to develop these far-flung places through tourism. The method, by saving them for trekkers and not tourist who would, for instance, drive to Merak or Sakteng and return to Trashigang for night halt.
The idea sounds good. With the country poised to liberalize tourism and bring in 100,000 tourists in the next 2 years, the benefit from the industry should trickle down even to yak herders. The number of tourists visiting Bhutan is rapidly picking up. At local festivals tourists are actually outnumbering locals. And with tourists encountering more tourists, some are even complaining of Bhutan no longer being the exotic country or the last Shangrila they have been told of. Many tourists want to see real Bhutan, away from places like Thimphu and Paro.
In the next two years, we will see the crowd becoming bigger as Bhutan chases its 100,000 tourists target. It is in this light, the Lyonchhoen’s idea will work. People of Merak and Sakteng will only benefit if tourists visit them. The benefit to the community will start coming only when communities are involved. It will start coming if we have community based or for that matter, village based tourism.
If there is one section of Bhutanese who should benefit from tourism, it is the Layaps, the Merakpas and the Saktengpas whose photographs, blown up on the front pages of travel magazines and brochures attract tourists to Bhutan. The returns they get are nothing compared with the contribution they make in marketing Bhutan as an exotic tourist destination.
At the same time it is not only tourism that could benefit Merak or Sakteng. While the Lyonchhoen’s idea sounds good, what about the people of Sakteng? Is it also their idea to not have a road to their village? Some argue that it sounds like a plan to keep Merak and Sakteng a living museum, away from mainstream development, to satisfy the urges of tourists looking for the out of the world experience. The economic benefits to them could come more from road access than the seasonal tourists. How the yak herders of Merak and Sakteng feel is not known.
The debate on Merak and Sakteng’s road access applies to Bhutan as a whole as it markets itself as an exclusive destination Tourism will be an important source of revenue and employment for the country but does it mean that tourism should decide how we develop?
Original story by Kuensel
Similar Stories