Lessons learned: Nepal's experience implementing sustainable rural tourism development model of Tourism for Rural Poverty Alleviation Programme

The Tourism for Rural Poverty Alleviation Programme (TRPAP) aims to improve the livelihood of people by harnessing their participation in tourism development activities. TRPAP is active in six districts of Nepal, namely Taplejung (Kangchenjunga), Solukhumbu (Everest), Rasuwa (Langtang), Chitwan, Rupandehi (Lumbini) and Dolpa. The Programme has focussed on raising awareness of tourism issues, and facilitated organisational responses through community participation. It has successfully formed a series of community groups and enabled local people to engage in tourism. TRPAP seeks to contribute to poverty alleviation in Nepal by mainstreaming pro-poor sustainable tourism policies, and developing strategies and innovative models that are pro-women, pro-environment and pro-communities. There are good opportunities for national and international pro-poor sustainable tourism practitioners to learn lessons from the TRPAP experience during its five years of implementation since September 2001.