Toledo Ecotourism Association - Local Benefits & Economic Income Evaluation

Since its conception, the underlying motive determining the Toledo Ecotourism Association's program is that as much of the local population should benefit from the income of ecotourism as is possible. The vast majority of the money spent on a tour stays within the immediate local community. Money is spent by tourists on accommodation in the village guesthouse, tours in and around the village and on meals eaten in the homes of local families – 80% of this money is retained by the Toledo Ecotourism Association members who provide the services. The remaining 20% is taken by the office and subdivided into a 10% administration fund and a 10% health and education fund (named the 10% community fund) that is returned to the host population to pay for medicine, books, stationary, school football trips and so on. When taxes paid to the government are taken into account, approximately 85% of all money spent is retained as income by the local community which the tourist has visited.

Entire villages therefore benefit from ecotourism and the income it brings. The greatest economic benefit is acquired by the TEA members who provide the services for tourists. The Toledo Ecotourism Association members operate on a rotational system so that each takes turns in providing food or acting as a guide – economi benefits are therefore distributed fairly amongst members. There are a total of approximately 180 TEA members distributed unevenly amongst the TEA villages in Toledo – Medina Bank has 44 members (where only a few households do not have at least one member) while San Antonio, the largest village, has just 8 members. These members benefit greatly from the additional income provided by the TEA programme, which supplements their regular income which is usually obtained by farming. The TEA chairman in Laguna noted that the extra income made through tourism was important because it was obtained throughout the year, unlike farming which provided income only at harvest time (just once or twice a year).

However, low tourist numbers mean that these economic benefits obtained are not great. Prior to Hurricane Iris, the TEA was distributing approximately 400 tourists per year amongst the nine participating villages, with each village receiving approximately $400 BZ ($200 US) in the form of the 10% community fund [These figures are estimates by TEA Executive Chairman Mr P. Ack, and may be inaccurate]. The first ecolodge to be fully reconstructed was finished by June 2002 and, as of March 2003, all but one ecolodge had been completed. During this ten month period just 110 visitors have been received in total and have contributed a total of $1375 BZ ($687.5 US) to the 10% community fund [These are official figures obtained from P. Ack by e-mail]. Despite these low visitor rates, ecotourism does make an important economic contribution to the villagers. Wall [1997, p.488] notes of ecotourism that “Even though sums of money may not be large, it should be acknowledged that their consequences may be substantial when they are injected into economies that are also small”. The “multiplier effect” will be important in these small Maya communities as the “initial primary expenditures are multiplied as the money is spent and then spent again” [ Sherman & Dixon , 1991, p.97]. The money spent by tourists is therefore a valuable injection of capital into small communities that are relatively very poor and the 10% community fund is likely to make an important contribution to health and education facilities that are very much under-equipped.

The results of my interviews, demonstrate ecotourism’s importance to the Toledo Ecotourism Association's villages. Sixteen out of eighteen interviewees responded that the entire community benefited from the TEA program, and of them six pointed out that the TEA members saw most of the benefit. Seventeen of the eighteen local Maya people interviewed had a positive attitude towards tourism – one interviewee’s attitude was apathetic due to his exclusion from the TEA program, a point that I address in depth in Section X. One TEA member in Laguna did however believe that a quarter of the local residents thought that the TEA program was “no good”, noting that it was generally the “illiterate and elderly” that thought this. She believed that they did not fully understand the TEA’s importance and significance.

Three of the Toledo Ecotourism Association members in San Jose , along with TEA chairman Mr Ack, noted that funding was a major problem for the TEA. In the past, the TEA has received small grants from the World Wildlife Fund and The Nature Conservancy for the expansion of the program into additional villages. In July 2000, the TEA received a grant of $1245 US from the United Nations Development Program “to prepare a project aimed at training and equipping indigenous people from ten communities to monitor biodiversity in their communities using birds as an indicator species” [www.undp.org]. However, funding has been minimal and this has proved to be a major problem for the TEA. Local residents in San Jose mentioned that there were quite extensive unexcavated Maya ruins nearby, but the TEA had been unable to find funding for a tourist eco-trail to be cleared to provide access.

Problems have been encountered even when the Toledo Ecotourism Association has secured funding. Following Hurricane Iris, a grant of $200,000 BZ ($100,000 US) was provided by the Swiss Development Fund for the reconstruction of all nine TEA community run ecolodges. The contract that was signed by the previous TEA executive chairman gave 70% of the grant directly to a consultancy firm, called Janus Corporation, who organised the rebuilding of the ecolodges. As a result, the TEA members were only paid for half of their labour in reconstructing the guesthouses - the remainder of the reconstruction was done voluntarily. The TEA chairman in San Jose summed up the opinion of the TEA when he said he felt they had been “ripped off” by Janus Corporation who had “pocketed” most of the grant. Why this unfavourable contract was ever agreed to remains unclear, but the consequence is that many TEA members, who voluntarily had to rebuild their local guesthouses, are now very reluctant to allow new members to join the programme. As a result, the TEA’s policy of distributing economic benefits throughout the community is threatened.

The Toledo Ecotourism Association ’s financial problems were clear from my attendance at the September 2002 TEA Executive and Chairmen’s Meeting, where the main issue of debate was the 20% of tourist expenditure retained by the TEA office to cover administrative costs and the community fund. The TEA chairman and treasurer claimed that this was now an insufficient amount to run the office and needed to be increased to 30%. Most of the TEA village chairman disapproved of this idea and gave both public and private opinions as to the cause of the financial problems – that some villages were not contributing their 20% in the first place, that the office wasn’t staffed properly and so tourist business was lost, and that the office telephone was over-used by the Executive Chairman’s family and friends. In the end, a compromise was reached. However, the situation that had arisen implied that the program was proving to be economically unsustainable and would have to be adjusted.

The Toledo Ecotourism Association clearly provides economic benefits to entire communities, benefits that do compliment rather than overwhelm traditional practices and that generate additional sources of income. The TEA’s financial problems appear to be in part caused by mismanagement, but mainly due to the low visitor rates. Many members and local residents attribute these low visitor numbers to the government’s failure to provide assistance and to promote both Toledo and the TEA as a tourist destination, an issue discussed further in Section X. For ten years, the TEA has struggled to attract tourists, yet the local population continues to believe that the future holds good prospects for tourism in Toledo . If these hopes fail to materialise and visitor numbers remain low, the sustainability of the programme may be threatened as the members grow disillusioned and abandon it.

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