Uttarakhand's Ecotourism Development is Being Mismanaged :

The state of Uttarakhand occupies an important place in dialogues on conservation issues related to natural resources and their use, environmentalism of the poor, scientific management of forests, exploitation and depletion of forests, restrictive forest regulations and violation of local customary forest rights. Further, for a long time Uttarakhand has been facing unemployment, out-migration and threats from unsustainable tourism practices. Since the creation of Uttarakhand, tourism has been recognised as an important component for development of the state. Nature-based tourism is one popular form of tourism in the state. Ecotourism is considered to be the most appropriate model for it. The Ecotourism Development Corporation Uttarakhand (ETDC), established in March 2017, almost after 17 years of formation of the Uttarakhand state, is an important step in this direction. This is being projected by the government as a step towards promoting ecotourism. However, an analysis of the work assigned to and undertaken by this corporation, points to a different picture, far from the ideals of ecotourism vis-a-vis conservation.

The Forest Movements of Uttarakhand, Separate State Movement and Ecotourism  :

The most popular among was the Chipko movement (in the 1970s). Unfortunately, the success of these movements got interpreted in an unintended manner—as some form of “deep ecology” or “back to nature” movement—due to the growing conservation discourse dominating environmental concerns of the developed countries. Tourism is one of the fastest growing sectors of the economy around the world. Ecotourism has been used as a market-based approach to conservation in many parts of the world. Thus institutionalising ecotourism through ETDC brings forward scope of local regional development and meeting the conservation needs of the state if carried out in accordance with certain principles and ethical bases in tourism practices. But mere usage of the term ecotourism does not guarantee sustainability and rising of the private sector in tourism in the recent years threatens the very principles of ecotourism. 

Uttarakhand and Ecotourism Discourse :

In Uttarakhand, the ecotourism discourse has been popular since the 1990s. The work had been undertaken by the forest epartment, the Forest Development Corporation, and the Kumaon Mandal Vikas Nigam and the Garhwal Mandal Vikas Nigam at various places. Due to the ecotourism’s nature of involving the forests and wildlife Forest Department has always been an important player in this. A separate wing of forest department exists for planning and conducting ecotourism in the state. However, if looked deeply, their works reflect an incomplete understanding of the term ecotourism and promoting nature tourism with hardly benefits going to the community. In the recent years through the discourse like avi tourism ( Bird watching ) the community is being involved by the forest department. On the one hand, a question emerges if already existing institutions took sufficient care of ecotourism, why to develop new institutions. On the other hand, it is to observe that in the recent times tourism has been dominated by mass tourism or high-end capital intensive industry. So there has been a perennial question of low or little local benefits in tourism to local populations whose traditional sociocultural and livelihood rights have been affected by environmental regulations.

The ETDC and the Work :

The ETDC is formed under the Companies Act 2013. According to the letter the stated reason for the creation of ETDC was to give encouragement to the promotion of ecotourism in of Uttarakhand which has rich biodiversity, wildlife and scenic beauty. Further, according to the same document ecotourism is essential to stop outmigration and strengthen the regional economy.

It has been more than 3 year that the ETDC has come into existence. Looking at the working of the ETDC it can be said that all the key management personnel belong to the government. There is no change in the orientation of officials. There is also no clear understanding of the concept of ecotourism which is seen only as nature-based tourism. No definition was found to be adopted in the documents.

 It is interesting to note that Uttarakhand time and again has claimed of working on ecotourism policy since the creation of the state but has still not passed the ecotourism policy; even a draft policy is not yet finalised. Earlier, this work was carried out by the ecotourism wing of the state forest department. The ETDC has also not contributed to formulation of a clear policy so far.The first and foremost work undertaken by the ETDC pertained to the development of the Kotdwar ecotourism circuit. No work was found to be undertaken by it pertaining to community involvement. According to the documents for developing ecotourism circuit it identifies seven forest rest houses. The involvement of forest rest house in ecotourism is another issue which has been objected by the Supreme Court in a judgment. According to the judgment the forest rest houses were found to be misused for a variety of reasons. So in any condition they are not to be used for activities like tourism or any such form like ecotourism among other rules and regulations in their usage. Rather than focusing on the rest houses, the corporation could have focused on community-based model of ecotourism stressing on homestays since the beginning.  This also reflects that community was not other than this, the work assigned to it pertains to the construction/upgradation of the Kandi Road (link road) between Kotdwar and Ramnagar. 

The ETDC is a nodal agency to carry out this work. The planned Kandi road proposal has created a big controversy from both conservation and ecotourism point of view. The ETDC till date has not involved local people actively in ecotourism. Further, the agenda for works to be conducted so far does not highlight the principles of ecotourism.

Thus, the works undertaken by the ETDC indicate a lack of seriousness on the part of the state government for promoting ecotourism. Ecotourism has become more of a rhetoric than practice. It appears that in the name of ecotourism the works promoted are more in line with the developmental needs, not related with conservation. If ETDC has to successfully establish it as an institution to promote conservation based development through ecotourism in the state it needs to look at the sustainability issues, vis local involvement, economic growth and ecological concerns.The forest and wildlife-based institutions have a history of forwarding the colonial legacy and presently the neo-liberal interests in the natural resources. Under the neo-liberal framework, with tourism as an industry there is a fear of the institution falling into the hands of the same vested interests. Such scenario brings more threats to both the conservation and benefits of local communities from nature-based tourism.