: Kerala is showing the political will to pursue the agenda of Responsible Tourism and has emerged as a laboratory for the much-lauded initiative, Responsible Tourism (RT) expert Harold Goodwin has said.
The support extended from the highest level despite the change-of-guard at the Union government and local bodies was an indication of the importance attached to the initiative, Dr. Goodwin, who was in the capital in connection with a house-hold survey in Kumarakom panchayat to assess the economic impact of RT, told The Hindu .
The State has emerged as a laboratory for RT, offering the practitioners many aspects to learn such as involvement of local bodies and community, a large number of hotels, and tourists flying down from all over the world.
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Dr. Goodwin said the RT initiative, launched in 2007 in Kovalam, Thekkady, Kumarakom, and Wayanad, had been identified as a global model for promoting community-based tourism activities in developing countries.
As part of the household survey, employment generation, the scale of meat and vegetable sales, and goods and services offered would be assessed. Dr. Goodwin said the findings would be an evidence for what RT had been able to do in Kumarakom in a small period.
The survey, being carried out by a five-member team headed by State RT Field Coordinator K. Roopesh Kumar, will be completed in six months. The findings will be presented in an RT conference to be organised by the Kerala Institute of Tourism and Travel Studies (KITTS) here in January next. KITTS has been made a nodal agency for implementing RT in the State.
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Household survey at Kumarakom to assess
RT impact.