New Approach of tourism community cluster in the Maya Jungle (El Mirador-El Zotz-Las Guacamayas)
We are working to encourage conservation by creating a self-sustainable business based on the jungle as a main attraction, giving the jungles an economic. Private investment in optimizing capabilities in the process of creating a relationship of mutual gain between operators and communities is the innovative approach.
The Maya Jungle combines great pyramids of the Mayan civilization and dense jungles of the Maya Biosphere Reserve, creating a unique life experience.
The community of Carmelita offers a five-day tour to El Mirador, the most ancient and magnificent pyramids of the world; Cruce a Dos Aguadas offers a three-day tour to El Zotz, a congregation of millions of bats and a walk ...
Sobre ti
Información de contacto
Title
Mr.
First name
Benedicto
Last name
Grijalva
Your job title
Merchadizing manager
Name of your organization
Martsam Tour & Travel
Organization type
Tipo de organización
Annual budget/currency
Presupuesto anual
Mailing address
Dirección
Telephone number
Número de teléfono
Postal/Zip Code
Código Postal
Country
Guatemala
Website
http://Sitio web
Email address
Alternative email address
Otro e-mail
tu idea
Esta será la dirección usada para marcar tu participación en el mapa.
Street Address
-
City
-
State/Province
Provincia
Postal/Zip Code
Código Pos
Country
Guatemala
Geotourism Challenge Addressed by Entrant
Quality of tourist experience and educational benefit to tourists , Quality of benefit to residents for the destination , Quality of tourism management by destination leadership , Quality of stewardship of the destination.
Organization size
Small (1 to 100 employees)
Indicate sector in which you principally work
Tourism-related business
Year innovation began
2001
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Indicate sector in which you principally work
Adventure.
Name Your Project
New Approach of tourism community cluster in the Maya Jungle (El Mirador-El Zotz-Las Guacamayas)
Describe Your Idea
We are working to encourage conservation by creating a self-sustainable business based on the jungle as a main attraction, giving the jungles an economic. Private investment in optimizing capabilities in the process of creating a relationship of mutual gain between operators and communities is the innovative approach.
The Maya Jungle combines great pyramids of the Mayan civilization and dense jungles of the Maya Biosphere Reserve, creating a unique life experience.
The community of Carmelita offers a five-day tour to El Mirador, the most ancient and magnificent pyramids of the world; Cruce a Dos Aguadas offers a three-day tour to El Zotz, a congregation of millions of bats and a walk ...
BID/FOMIN
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Deseo postularme.
Si perteneces a un pais de Latinoamerica y el Caribe tienes la oportunidad de presentar tu iniciativa para acceder a fondos para innovaciones en turismo sostenible del BID/FOMIN (para mayor informacion leer la seccion sobre la oportunidad BID/FOMIN en la pagina principal del Desafio).
Consumidores (viajeros).
Indica cuales de estas tematicas cubre tu innovacion (elige todas aquellas opciones que apliquen)
Cartografía.
Innovación
What is the goal of your innovation? Please describe in one sentence the kind of impact, change, or reform your approach is intended to achieve.
Optimizing communitarian tourism regarding tourism management, customer service as well as social and environmental commitment, to create a unique and global experience.
Please write an overview of your project. Include how your approach supports or embodies geotourism or destination stewardship. This text will appear when people scroll over the icon for your entry on the map located on the competition homepage.
We are working to encourage conservation by creating a self-sustainable business based on the jungle as a main attraction, giving the jungles an economic. Private investment in optimizing capabilities in the process of creating a relationship of mutual gain between operators and communities is the innovative approach.
The Maya Jungle combines great pyramids of the Mayan civilization and dense jungles of the Maya Biosphere Reserve, creating a unique life experience.
The community of Carmelita offers a five-day tour to El Mirador, the most ancient and magnificent pyramids of the world; Cruce a Dos Aguadas offers a three-day tour to El Zotz, a congregation of millions of bats and a walk in the jungle ending with the most famous Maya city: Tikal; finally Paso Caballos (our latest project) is in the process of engaging in Las Guacamayas Biological Station, where visitors participate in the development of scientific and social projects.
Developing skills of the human factor is the main objective. Second but not least is the optimization of businesses including the treatment of animals, equipment, security systems, etc.
Explain in detail why your approach is innovative
The innovative approach is the public-private partnerships. Our own investment in developing local technical capacity is a business approach to create a real self-sustainable base.
The company gradually passes-on leadership tourist service to the local tourism committees as soon as they improve their technical skills.
The company is committed to:
Promote in every possible way the development of capacities for tourist services
Product design and development according to worldwide tourist expectations
International Marketing
The local tourist committees undertake:
Develop clear working and service rules for visitors and service providers
Serious commitment to participate in events destined to skill development
Serious commitment for integrating sustainable tourism practices in their work and daily life.
Impacto
Describe the degree of success you have had to date. How do you measure, both quantitatively and qualitatively, the impact on sustainability or enhancement of local culture, environment, heritage, or aesthetics? How has it transformed or contributed to the power of place or demonstrated the sustainability of tourism? How does your approach minimize negative impacts?
Economically, the tourism committee of the Indian Q `eqchi from Cruce a Dos Aguadas, has more than a thousand customers a year, meaning more than 75 thousand dollars for them.
At the request of the local tourism committee, we began working with The Guacamayas Biological Station (Paso Caballos) and Carmelita, who were aware of the progress of Cruce a Dos Aguadas and are initiating a flow of customers this year.
Conservation organizations such as Wildlife Conservation Society and Balam Foundation, the National Council of Protected Areas (NGO) are our allies and strengthen conservation efforts in these areas, advocating that tourism can be an economical alternative to protect the jungle.
For people in Cruce a Dos Aguadas the jungle is their product and they deal with jungle fires, illegal logging and hunting. People from Paso Caballos, especially children, are deeply involved in projects for the protection of the Guacamaya Roja and their efforts allow the survival of the last 200 pairs of these magnificent birds, and ate the same time are involved in the struggle against jungle fires.
These projects show concrete results and only need strategic investment to grow properly.
In what ways are local residents actively involved in your work, including participation and community input? How has the community responded to or benefited from your approach?
Three families began the project in Cruce a Dos Aguadas, and more than 18 are involved now. We began to work with the committees of Paso Caballos and Carmelita responding to their own request, because they had noticed the progress of the community of Cruce Dos Aguadas.
People from these three communities continually attend workshops that are another key factor in public-private partnership, and a way of demonstrating their commitment. Also, people (and not just tourism committees) are involved in conservation activities such as fire struggle, caring for guacamaya nests, monitoring, etc.
How does your program promote traveler enthusiasm, satisfaction, and engagement with the locale?
We design products using science to support conservation efforts of organizations such as WCS, CONAP and others actively working in these areas, in addition to the national archeology and history entity (IDAEH). In this way we ensure the information that the visitor receives.
All the communitarian guides are trained and certified by the National Tourism Authority (INGUAT) and constantly reinforce their skills in workshops. Moreover, there is constant monitoring by way of feedback from the activities shared with the community to achieve the total satisfaction of the visitor.
Describe how your work helps travelers and local residents better understand the value of the area's cultural and natural heritage, and educates them on local environmental issues.
Local guides convey part of their culture, as an example, the speech of the Qéqchi guides is almost a product of their own personal knowledge, including culture, knowledge of medicinal plants, dancing, surviving in the jungle, animal behavior, etc.
In the Biological Station Las Guacamayas, the experience is sharing the local conservation efforts, where local people are involved in preserving the population of Guacamaya Roja. The commitment of these people, the local effort to protect the nests, is an emotional experience.
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Sustenibilidad
How is your initiative currently financed? If available, provide information on your finances and organization that could help others. Please list: Annual budget, annual revenue generated, size of part-time, full-time and volunteer staff.
The innovative approach is a public-private partnership. We develop a social area of the company (Pro Crea) to seek financing in strategic points of the production chain and accelerate the process, because we noticed that the project’s progress is effective, but slow.
Martsam Travels annual budget for capacity building is about $ 1000 per community, including transportation, food and wages for trainers. We must also add our staff’s time in managing organizations to optimize the program which means about $ 3000 a year. We use the fuel and company vehicles for all these matters, which involves about another $ 1000 a year. We started nine years ago, with Cruce a Dos Aguadas and this year with Carmelita and Paso Caballos.
The local tourism committees must seriously commit their selves to supporting the initiative with their presence and participation
Is your initiative financially and organizationally sustainable? If not, what is required to make it so? Is there a potential demand for your innovation?
The initiative is fully sustainable, because the entire investment of the project comes from the profit of the business itself. This initiative is now fully working. We make our own investment profits, and the communities do the same thing. But it means that the pace of work has been slow and has taken years.
We are working with the Biological Station Las Guacamayas (Paso Caballos) Carmelita responding to their own request, which shows the demand for this innovation.
What are the main barriers you encounter in managing, implementing, or replicating your innovation? What barriers keep your program from having greater impact?
The project’s investment comes from the flow of our own resources, thus, we have had a slow pace of work. For example, we are planning to buy mules and launch a system for the proper treatment of animals in Carmelite and Cruce Dos Aguadas, but this requires a large investment in a given time, so we are seeking funding for these costs that exceed our budget. This is the moment in the project, where we want to inject some "big gift" to the tourism committees, which have shown deep commitment to the project. To this end, we created Pro Crea, a nonprofit organization to seek funding at strategic points in the production chain work.
Investment in marketing is expensive and could accelerate the project by increasing our participation in international business fairs, to promote these communitarian products as a world class experience. The production of propaganda (several products, souvenirs, pamphlets, Internet pages, etc.), to be used as sales tools for prospective customers or to supplement the information and enhance the visitor’s experience, could also have a large impact on the project
What is your plan to expand or further develop your approach? Please indicate where/how you would like to grow or enhance your innovation, or have others do so.
We want Paso Caballos and Carmelita to reach a level of succeed such as Cruce Dos Aguadas Aguadas has reached, and in a couple of years, include the community of El Chorro, near the archaeological site Ceibal.
The following steps in each community must be analyzed and developed according to their special needs. As an illustration, in Cruce Dos Aguadas, we plan to extend the trip a day more, directly into the community and create a center run by women and children, where visitors spend the day immersed in the daily lives of local people, before the visitor begins the jungle adventure.
La historia
Please provide a personal bio. Note this may be used in Changemakers' marketing material.
Established in 1994, Martsam Travel is committed to providing high quality services in the tourism and especially in the Maya world.
Some of the major travel guides as Lonely Planet, Rough Guide, Let's go, Central America Handbook, Frank Herrmann's Guatemala, The Rotary Club guide, Fodor's and others, recognize our quality and personalized service.
Martsam Travel and Rainforest Alliance have established an alliance to work with service providers in the implementation of Best Practices and Sustainable Tourism since May 2006. The company is always among the top five certified tourist companies.
What is the origin of your innovation? Tell the Changemakers and media communities what prompted you to start this initiative.
Considering the importance of conserving natural resources and the revenue generated by local communities (in and around protected areas) through ecotourism activities, we have developed ecotourism travel services within the Maya Biosphere Reserve.
Martsam Travels environmental policy and its main aim is to help provide economic alternatives to farming communities, in order to stop or slow down the destruction of our ancient Mayan jungle. As a result, we hope to inspire in them a desire to be stewards of these valuable resources, because they can get from them an income-based on responsible tourism.
The product offered by these communities is a close contact with nature, its people and its history. Innovation is an initiative from the standpoint of a management model. In the last decade, nonprofit organizations launched tourism in the area. But the focus was to help the communities around them, as it were a gift for them. In the short term, these initiatives failed because there was no strategy to involve people and make them feel that the project was part of their lives.
Another way to appreciate the innovation is to describe the project as private companies making investment in developing local community’s capacities by a public-private partnership where everyone plays their role to create a synergy of care to visitors.
Our methodology is a win-win relationship with these communities.
The company is committed to:
Promote in every possible way the development of capacities for the tourist service
Product design and development according to the expectations of tourists in the world
International Marketing
The local tourist committees undertake:
Developing clear rules of work and attention to visitors and vendors
Serious commitment to participate in events to develop skills
Serious commitment to integrating sustainable tourism in their work and daily life.
The Maya Jungle, with its incredible jungle and its archaeological context, seems an obvious destination for world-wide tourists. In its natural and historical context it must be within the five sites that visitors should see some time in their lives. It is unbelievable that the community tourism approach is innovative in the area, and most of its potential has not been made use of. Without a doubt, our project is the most successful of the area.
Describe some unique tourist experiences that your approach provides. Be specific; give illustrative examples.
The Maquin family, an indigenous family of Q `eqchi from Cruce a Dos Aguas, is the most involved family in the tourism field. They lead a hike in the jungle for three days called El Zotz-Tikal.
The first contact with these people makes you feel as if you entered in a reign of exotic jungle, where you feel overwhelmed. The magic of human empathy makes you feel that the introductory speech contains concepts that I prefer to save for those who wish to experience the journey.
The first day, visitors go to El Zotz reserve and visit the archaeological site. In the evening the guides take them to a cliff, where insects come out of the guano and various mammals visit the place to feed them. Hawks and owls are also waiting in the branches around. Suddenly, like a rain of millions of bats of several species start flying from the cliff simulating rivers in the sky. Literally they can be captured with a single stretch of the hands. The natural spectacle is exciting.
The second day is a walk in the jungle, including activity camp in the heart of the Maya Biosphere. The traveler, not only feels the real contact with nature, but has the best care of their guides, who cook the most delicious food using their well-known chef skills.
The third day, visitors feel the sensation of the first people who discovered the ancient city of Tikal. Their eyes are revealed with the highest pyramid of Tikal. This city is an essential destination for any visitor coming to Guatemala.
The heart of the tour is the guide’s improvisation, the way that he conveys emotions, the way that he makes tourists feel comfortable even in the depths of the jungle, the security, the magic of the interaction with man, history and the jungle.
What types of partnerships or professional development would be most beneficial in spreading your innovation?
One of the key factors in this public-private partnership is "Local communities need to work to get their things." We try to avoid (if possible) "donations" and encourage the concept of working to obtain their own supplies. It is a way to ensure their care in a long-term, which has been one of the major mistakes of other tourism initiatives in the area.
Marketing the product around the world can be a key factor for success. Because the more tours we can achieve for them, the greater the investment will be to improve their product.
 | 150 weeks agoAlfredo Valle submitted this idea. |