Jaime Ernesto Rivera-Hernandez

Towards an Environmental Education and Community Ecotourism Programme in San Juan Teponaxtla Oaxaca 2nd Phase

Environmental Education Activities.

Language recovery workshop with elder as teacher.

In this second phase of our project, we will develop different activities before the implementation of the ecotourism project, because people needs to be ready to receive external people and also we need to make the feasibility study and to accomplish the biodiversity studies we made in the previous stage. In this way, we will develop the next activities and programmes:

Ecotourism work plan. In this part, we will develop the feasibility study, and also we will make the necessary plans and estimations regarding the costs and material necessaries for the construction of the ecotourism paths, visitor’s reception, and other necessary equipment for the project implementation.
Training programme. Our workshops will focus on Ecotourism guides and design and planning of informative/educational paths; Project’s administration and management, and attention to the visitor’s needs. Ultimately we are encouraging the self-management of the project.

Environmental education programme. With this programme, the community will become aware of the importance of conservation biodiversity, cleanliness, hygiene, and the correct disposal of waste, such as battery and rubbish recycling, dogs litter, etc. This programme will include different activities: school activities, workshops, posters and leaflets, speeches, videos, etc. The people involving in the project as ecotourism guides and environmental educators will help us with all the activities in this programme, as a practical way of training.

Handicraft projects. We will develop a programme to elaborate some handicraft, such as Embroidery for the conservation and local liana baskets. These handicrafts are complementary activities for the main ecotourism plan, and will enrich the ecotourism offer.

Native language recovery programme. which will help local people to recover their own language and will encourage younger people to speak it. We will organise classes for children, youths and adults. The teachers will be the elders people.

Plants and herpetological inventories. These studies will be made throughout the year in order to cover all the seasons. These studies accomplish the previous studies regarding birds and mammals.

Read about Phase 1 of this project http://www.ruffordsmallgrants.org/rsg/projects/jaime_e_rivera-hernandez or for more information contact jriverah@geobicom.org or visit www.geobicom.org