EFFECTS OF TOURISM

The greatest power a person has to change the world is their spending power (and this is especially true of those bringing money from a stronger economy into a weaker one). Unfortunately, people often do not realise the full effects of their choices.

South Americans may sometimes seem a bit pushy but it is the unfortunate fact that, in a country where over 50% of the population are living in poverty, they have to be this way to survive. This means that your choice to buy your vegetables from a stall rather than a supermarket could make a huge difference to the life of the stallholder (new shoes for his child, medication or even something as basic as his next meal).

As the main business of Peru, tourism provides the incomes of thousands of people. But tourism can have hidden effects too. Take the example of Colca Canyon. As the deepest canyon in the world and close to Peru's 2nd most visited city (Arequipa), Colca attracts thousands of visitors each day. Many of these visitors choose to trek into the canyon itself and stay at one of the villages at the bottom. Almost all of the tour companies take their clients to stay in Juan Pablo, creating an income for many of the people who live there.

What the visitors to Colca may not know is that the canyon used to function as a carefully balanced co-operative. For centuries, each village in the canyon was assigned a different crop or product to produce each year. The produce would then be shared among all the communities so that everyone had a bit of everything. Unfortunately, when the tourists started coming into the canyon, the village where most people stay dropped out of this co-operative, upsetting the balance and causing a knock-on effect that affected everyone in the canyon.

Not only this, but the people of the canyon are experts in herbal medicine. They know which plants to use to cure anything from headaches to broken bones. When Westerners started trekking through the canyon, the young people of Colca saw their clothes, their cameras, their personal CD players and started to leave for the cities in search of a 'better' life, leaving no one behind for the elders to pass their knowledge of plants onto.

Unfortunately this is not the only example of tourism causing problems in South America, often the effects that cause problems are ones that come from tourism growing without people really considering the impacts of their actions.

This is why it is so important for people travelling in South America (and other countries) to use their spending power intelligently. Ask us to help you book culturally and environmentally sound tours.

***UNIQUE TOUR***

Learn the secrets of medicinal herbs and live the lifestyle of the Colca Incas!

You can spend seven days living with the people of Colca and learning their ways whilst experiencing the beauty of the deepest canyon in the world.

See our Book Tours page for more details of this unique experience.

The price of the tour includes a donation to our project work.