A seminar on “Responsible Tourism” was organized by
Notre Dame Nature Study club (NDNSC), supported by USAID Bangladesh and
Nishorgo Network. Having a theme of ‘Viewing nature without disturbing it’,
this virtual seminar started at 12:00 PM, 26 September, in Notre Dame College.
An enthusiastic learning presentation and video which was highly productive,
leaving the students aware of keeping the nature, forests and wetland clean
when they travel.
The seminar started with a video showing about the
IPAC (Integrated Protected Area Co-management) project. There are 26
reserved areas in Bangladesh. People who live there know that place like none
other and Nishorgo is doing a collaborate project named IPAC
(Integrated Protected Area Co-management) with Government of Bangladesh,
trying to conserve the forests and wet lands. Launched in June 4, 2008[ii],
this project has some critical targets and achievements:
- Conservation and management
- Leaving something for future generation
- Implement govt. initiative in 26 Protected Areas (PA) in Bangladesh with co-operation under IPAC project
- Co-management, help local communities to let them know how to save the environment by themselves
- There are 22000+ people working under Nishorgo Network.
Then the seminar went ahead with a new presenter
talking about different types of tourism such as:
Sustainable tourism
- Do you really need to travel that many times to the same place?
Eco-Tourism
- Travelling and Eco-friendly
Responsible Tourism:
Dos/Don’ts
- No harm to local sites
- Tourist’s responsibility
- Learn & Conserve
- Try contributing
- Don’t disturb wildlife
- No littering
- No loud speaker
- No outside food
- Don’t be wasteful
- Tour in small groups
- Follow rules
- Take only pictures; take no leaves, flowers, shells
- Don’t disturb wildlife
- Enjoy the nature
In a nutshell, they elaborated that responsible
tourism is about letting travelers and tourist know about how to keep the
biological diversity of the natural forests and wetlands by making them more
responsible and respectful to the natural environment.
After that, there was a question-answer session and
then the seminar came to an end.
