The second JICA eco-tourism course held from September 9 to October 14, 2013, was attended by eight administrative officials working in the field of tourism promotion from Albania, Argentina, Georgia, Kyrgyz, Peru, Serbia, Macedonia and East Timor. As in the first training session, the group learned about eco-tourism in the Kushiro region and other parts of Hokkaido, Tokyo, Kyoto and Okinawa. KIWC Technical Committee Chair Mr. Hisashi Shinsho again served as leader throughout the course.
Trainees experienced a wide variety of eco-tourism programs in Hokkaido’s autumnal environment. These included horseback trekking on indigenous Dosanko Horses, a fishing boat trip to an uninhabited island and an environmental study session with local children. Attendees analyzed these programs at weekly meetings and discussed what they had learned from them.
In Kyoto, trainees attended a workshop with university students majoring in tourism, and also exchanged views with young students on eco-tourism in their respective countries in a cafeteria at the university where the workshop was held.
On the last day of the course, trainees presented their action plans at the JICA Tokyo International Center. The concepts were tailored to actual situations in each country, and included ideas developed in Japan to encourage the use of natural and cultural regional assets in order to promote tourism and the allocation of profits in a way that will benefit the relevant locality.
