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| Endemic Pink Boa, Cayos Cochinos, Honduras.© HSI/Mario Mejia |
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By Toby Bloom
In the past 10 years, Honduras has emerged from the shadows of neighboring tourism powerhouses like Costa Rica as one of the top vacation destinations in Central America. The most popular tourism attractions in Honduras are Mayan ruins (Copan) and scuba diving (Bay Islands), but the Honduran ecotourism market has great potential for attracting the green tourist. Honduras includes the most extensive tracts of cloud forest and the largest remaining area of primary forest in Central America, with more than 100 protected areas, including 20 national parks. The country is also home to a number of important wildlife refuges and biological reserves, which provide excellent opportunities for wildlife viewing and other ecotourism activities.
Nature Guides Wanted
With so much opportunity, the only thing missing is the nature guide know-how! With this in mind, I headed to Honduras at the end of January to train local guides from Cayos Cochinos Marine Reserve. As Director of Wildlife Ecotourism for HSI, part of my job is to help the local communities gain the skills necessary to make a living working in ecotourism. I provide training on basic biology, natural and cultural history, and leadership skills, to motivate the guides to appreciate and protect the amazing animals that live in their communities, as well as the unique ecosystem that serves as their habitat.
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Tiny Island off the coast of Honduras.© HSI/Toby Bloom |
Goal: Improving CITES Implementation
This trip was made possible by a grant from the U.S. State Department to improve effective implementation of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) by the countries involved in the Dominican Republic-Central America United States Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA-DR). Ecotourism is an important part of HSI’s CAFTA-DR CITES program because it offers an economic alternative for local communities that might otherwise engage in activities that are harmful to local endangered species and their habitats. Illegal hunting, selling animals for the international pet trade, and overfishing all have devastating effects on wildlife, but ecotourism gives local communities a non-destructive method for capitalizing on their natural resources.
A Packed Week of Learning
Because there were so many topics to teach in such a short time, the training was very intense! For an entire week, trainees were out of bed by 5:30 AM every morning to go bird-watching, and in class throughout the day until 9:00 PM. They learned about topics such as coral reefs, the water cycle, endangered species, and the importance of protecting biodiversity. This is mandatory knowledge for any nature guide, but this information also helps the trainees see the importance of protecting wildlife and the fragile ecosystems in which they live. Once a nature guide understands for him or herself how everything in nature works together, they realize how important it is to protect all animals and their habitat, and they often become agents of change with the tourists they host, as well as in their communities. The trainees also learned important practical skills for guiding, such as how to develop a nature tour, how to make tour stops more interesting, and how to manage groups of tourists. Even though it was a big workload, all of the trainees gave 110 percent every day!
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| HSI's Toby Bloom congratulates a newly-trained nature guide.© HSI/Toby Bloom |
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Hands-On Practice, Then Graduation
After five days of training on the Honduras mainland, the training team took all of the guides back out to Cayos Cochinos (a cluster of small islands off the coast of Honduras) to practice their skills. The trainees were still working hard, but the trip to Cayos was a big treat for everyone: we took a boat tour of the islands, visited a biological research station, and even had a chance to snorkel and observe the beautiful coral reefs and fish that make the protected area so spectacular. The trainees were also very lucky to see four pink boas, a CITES Appendix I-protected animal, on one of their hikes. The pink boa constrictor is a snake that is endemic to Cayos Cochinos, which means that they exist nowhere else on Earth!
On the final day of the training, all trainees received their diplomas and a few received special prizes for their outstanding work during the course. Despite the rainy weather, the trainees and instructors were all smiles! I returned to the mainland and then back to the U.S. with the hope that this small but important step might help the trainees capitalize on the ecotourism opportunities in their country, as well as become strong voices for wildlife protection in Honduras and worldwide.
