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By Karen Bong
KUCHING, June 22: The Sarawak government will develop some specific geotrails and geosites in Sarawak Delta Geopark as part of the effort to not only increase its visibility in obtaining the Unesco Global Geoparks’s (UGGp) status but also create significant socio-economic benefits to the local communities.
Minister of Tourism, Performing Arts and Creative Industry Dato Sri Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah emphasised that the Sarawak Delta Geopark will contribute toward significant economic benefits to the local communities through the creation of more business and job opportunities and a vibrant tourism industry.
“We will also conduct some specific capacity building programmes for the local community, host geoguides, homestay operators, handicraft makers and tourism industry players,” he said when addressing the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) Destination Experience Forum and Mart 2023 at Borneo Convention Centre Kuching (BCCK) here today.
These are some of the plans arising from the Sarawak government’s recent successful benchmarking visit led by Deputy Premier Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan to various geosites and geotrails of Jeju Unesco Global Geopark in South Korea from June 14 to 20.
“There are many lessons learnt (from Jeju) that Sarawak can adopt in terms of geotourism products development and promotion,” he added.
Abdul Karim also highlighted that the Sarawak government has long recognised the importance of sustainability in all efforts, including tourism.
Under Sarawak’s Post-Covide Development Strategy (PCDS) 2030, he pointed out that ecotourism has been identified as the strategic focus under the Tourism Sector Aspiration.
“The Sarawak government recognises how ecotourism is a positive force for conservation and development that is economically and ecologically sustainable around the world.
“Among those KPIs (Key Performance Index) relevant to ecotourism are to increase community-based tourism which includes expanding the number of homestay clusters as well as enriching the monthly household incomes of homestay operators; as well as build eco-community hosts, among others.
“In terms of inspiring our local tourism stakeholders to adopt a sustainability mindset and practices and developing effective strategies and innovations that will benefit the ecosystem as a whole, we have conducted a Design Thinking for Responsible Tourism for the 12 Divisional Tourism Task Groups (DTTG) and the local communities in Sarawak,” he elaborated.
To continue to propagate responsible tourism and sustainability agenda, Abdul Karim emphasised the importance of cooperation and commitment from all industry players, who know the ‘ins-and-outs’ of the region’s tourism activities.
As such, he said the Forum which has gathered a sea of thought-leaders and experienced industry professionals served as the best platform to engage in dialogues for the betterment of the tourism industry.
Meanwhile, the event themed “Sustainability in Action” has attracted 272 delegates from 28 destinations across all corners of the globe for inspiring and insightful discussions on some of the major issues in marketing and managing tourism growth as the travel and tourism industry looks for new opportunities to promote sustainability within the industry.
Deputy Tourism Minister Datuk Sebastian Ting, Ministry’s permanent secretary Datu Sherrina Hussaini, Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) chief executive officer (CEO) Sharzede Salleh Askor, PATA chair Peter Semone, UNWTO Regional Department for Asia and The Pacific director Harry Hwang and Visit Maldives CEO Thoyyib Mohammed were among those present. — DayakDaily
