Miso Walai home stay Development in Malaysia

The host community at Miso Walai homestay development was a community that totally
depended on agriculture hunting and gathering and fishing before the Community Based
Tourism Project. The Community project has seen the community transform to being a
community that is environmentally conscious, and tourism has become a major source of income
to the community. The Miso Walai village has more than 35 households and is made up of about
400 people speaking some indigenous dialects of the Local orang Sungai.

In 2002, a number of previously different community tourism groups, launched through the
Model Ecologically Sustainable Community Conservation and Tourism (MESCOT), undertook a
consultative process and decided to combine forces into a single community tourism cooperative,
Koperasi Pelancongan (KOPEL Bhd) Berhad, which was registered in 2003.

The MESCOT retained responsibility for driving the overall program, maintaining community
support, coordinating tourism activities between groups, training villagers as guides, accountants,
and maintenance staff, and providing communications support, while the cooperative kept the
original community groups as separate administrative units. KOPEL's role was to bring
communities together via the attainment of common goals and to operate under the ownership-
by-share philosophy (Razzaq et al, 2012:9). The State Forestry Department has designated
KOPEL as the contractor for the ongoing rehabilitation. (Which involves getting rid of dead
trees, branches and vegetables that impede forest regeneration) of the Pin Supu Forest Reserve
(Yusof, 2012:1). In Batu Puteh, Kinabatangan, the cooperative now has 260 members from four
villages: Kampung Batu Puteh, Kampung Mengaris, Kampung Perpaduan, and Kampung
Singgah Mata. The profits from the business are used to fund community development programs
as well as pay cooperative members who participate in them (Zeppel, 2006). The Sabah Forestry
Department (SDF) and MESCOT signed a Memorandum of Understanding in 2008, empowering
the local community to manage the Supu Forest Reserve. Local people gained confidence and
self-esteem as a result of the engagement with SFD, which took the shape of forestry projects.
KOPEL assumed this task.The local community's major source of income was collaboration with
the SFD, though they could increasingly rely on tourists to supplement their income. Miso Walai
provides a village environment for tourists to explore the area's amazing animals, forestry, and
biodiversity, as well as a source of sustainable income for local communities (Hamzah &
Mohamad, 2012). The MESCOT project was started by the residents of Batu Puteh Community
in 1996 in reaction to the creation of the Lower Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary, which runs for
more than 160 kilometers along the lower Kinabatangan. Tourism was first considered as a
potential source of money and employment, particularly for the village's many unemployed
youth. Seasonal labor in adjacent wood camps had formerly provided a significant portion of the
community's income, particularly since the 1950s.

 According to Rosazman (2006), the MESCOT Project was launched in Batu Puteh in March
1997 with funding from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in Norway (Aref & Redzuan, 2009).
The project was designed and funded in collaboration with the Sabah Forestry Department by the
former State Ministry of Tourism and Environment Development.

The Miso Walai home stay program was presented to the Ministry of Tourism, Culture, and
Environment in Sabah. There were five activities under MESCOT: boat service (responsible for
wildlife observation cruises), guiding service (responsible for training local guides and local
history), culture groups (comprising a number of people doing different activities per group, such
as humanitarian activities), and Tulun Tukou handicraft (a group of women who were trained in
handicraft production from the four communities of the Miso Walai area) The Miso Walai home
stay program eventually evolved into a core program or umbrella for various similar activities.
The Miso Walai Home Stay program was officially marketed and started in November of 2000.
The Miso Walai home stay program's major goal was to integrate the local people in community-
based ecotourism. The Miso Walai home stay has its own uniqueness since the location is a part
of the Lower Kinabatangan Wildlife Tourism Corridor that is rich with natural biodiversity and
culture heritage. About 208 people of Mukim Batu Puteh were directly or indirectly involved in
the program with 23 families participating in the home stay program and 48 local people taking
part in the Boat Services Association. Meanwhile 33 youths became volunteers for
environmental protectors called ‘sukarelawan MESCOT’, and 22 other young people were
involved in the MESCOT Cultural Group (MSG) and more than 60 people joined the Tulon
Tokou Handicraft Association. Tourists’ arrivals in Miso Walai home stay increases from year to
year since 2000. Statistics indicated that there were 176 tourists Participated in the program in
the year 2000 and this number rose to 2943 tourists in 2009, with the total revenue more than
1,852,102 ZAR (South African Rand).
Foot trail in La Yunga in South America

The La Yunga village is located in the southern Amboró National Park buffer zone, about 150
kilometers from Santa Cruz. This settlement, which was made up of locals and Bolivia migrants,
had 250 residents (37 families). The village's infrastructure was quite poor, with only an
elementary school, no medical station, and no telephone. Farmers made up the majority of the
population. Throughout the year, the settlement might be accessed by car or small bus from
Santa Cruz, Bolivia's second largest city (three hours by car), or from Samaipata, a popular
domestic tourist destination (Monjeau & Pauquet, 2005). The community began building of a
lodge in 2002, with financial and technical assistance from national and international NGOs that
could accommodate just six people but had a nice restaurant that could seat 20 people. However,
with only 60 visitors per year, the lodge had a very low occupancy rate due to a lack of
communication, making bookings and organization difficult (Goodwin et al., 2009). The bulk of
CBT efforts in Bolivia, according to Goodwin and Santilli (2009), were based on the
construction of community-owned and controlled lodges or house stays. One such program in
Bolivia is La Yunga, where NGOs helped the community to develop. The lodge had attracted
only 60 visitors per year at a bed occupancy rate of 2.7%. To increase the town's earnings, they
created a walking route, which in 2005 attracted 1000 individuals who paid a $1.80 trail charge,
bringing in $1800 in total, including guide fees and other communal purchases. The case shows
that the traditional focus on lodging was incorrect, and that the community benefited
significantly more when it supplied an activity. Their effort needed a far smaller expenditure
than the lodge and yielded significantly greater results. The objective was that by implementing
these ideas, the local community would reap more benefits. The community completed a route in
2003 that was surrounded by giant ferns and well-integrated into the environment thanks to the
use of natural resources in its construction. The walkway is ideal for persons of all ages and takes
two to three and a half hours to stroll. The community charges a 10 boliviano (approximately
US$1.20) entrance fee for local visitors, and a 15 boliviano (about US$1.80) price for
international visitors. Project funding that came primarily from the NGO’s contributed a lot to
the successful development of the two initiatives, while the village provided labour as
counterpart. So far, a 5 km trail network, an eight-bed hostel for tourists and other infrastructure
have been built.
The Chalalan Eco-lodge in Bolivian Amazon.

On the banks of the Laguna Chalalan, the Chalalan eco-lodge was built using only locally and
sustainably obtained materials. The tourism facility was built using indigenous ecosystem
knowledge and was meant to have minimal influence on the neighboring forests. The eco-lodge
can hold up to 30 people at a time. The indigenous community owns and operates the lodge
exclusively. Business management, accounting, marketing, sales, customer service, food
preparation, guiding, navigation, and mapping are among the skills taught to employees.

The initiative began in 1993 when the community of San José de Uchupiamonas began looking
for funding to develop the necessary infrastructure for their ecotourism project. It took two years,
but funding was eventually secured in 1995, first through the Multilateral Investment Fund of the
Inter-American Development Bank, and later supplemented by a grant and technical assistance
from Conservation International. The official project name was “Sustainable Development and
Ecotourism Program in San José de Uchupiamonas and the establishment of a protected zone in
the proposed Madidi Park”.

This project was to be implemented between March 1995 and June 2001 with the aim of not only
establishing the eco-lodge, but also of catalyzing small-scale, private, self-sustaining ecotourism
companies in neighboring communities which would be sourced for ecotourism-associated goods
and services. These proposed businesses were to span organic agriculture for food production,
artisanal handicrafts for sale to tourists, transportation services, restaurants, and guiding services.
In the end, after extensive community consultation, leaders of the project decided against this
strategy, opting instead for a single company which combined various services into a single
administrative unit. One of the motivating factors for this decision was the great distance
between the community and eco-lodge – three hours upstream – and associated transport costs.

From 1997 to 1999, Chalalán was operated as a pilot project and sustained with financial support
from partner organizations. Small groups of tourists were brought to the eco-lodge on a trial
basis to familiarize indigenous community members with the changes they might reasonably
expect from an influx of visitors. In 1998, an office was opened in Rurrenabaque to promote the
site as a tourist destination. At the time, and owing in large measure to subsidies from their
partner organizations, the price of lodging at Chalalán averaged USD 38 per night. (When the
project became fully autonomous in 2000, the average price increased to USD 90 per night,
which was an unwelcome increase from the standpoint of tourism agencies who were confronted
with reduced profit margins). The two primary agencies through which Chalalan was promoted
were America Tours and GAP Adventures. The community has also since been quite active in
self-promotion of the eco-lodge and has succeeded in receiving coverage in both National
Geographic and Lonely Planet.