Mountain tourism: A boon or a bane? Impacts of tourism on Himalayan women

The mountain people of the Himalayas are among the most socially, politically and economically deprived people in the world, and yet their stewardship of mountain natural resources is closely linked to sustainability of life in lowland areas. Among mountain population, women play a crucial, and in many respects dominant role in natural resource management, agricultural production, tourism and the well-being and very survival of mountain families. In mountain regions, as in the world over, women, as a class, are more undernourished, under-compensated for their labor, and under-represented in formal decision making bodies. The only measure in which women collectively come out 'ahead' is lifespan; those who endure seem to be hardy?though in Nepal, women's life span is in average shorter than the life span of their counterpart. The condition of Himalayan women can be characterized by a few stylized facts (i) they are underrepresented in politics and bureaucracy; (ii) in South Asian countries more than 75% of mountain women fall below the poverty line; (iii) lack of infrastructure development causes inadequate access to basic services such as health, education, water, electricity etc; and (iv) existence of caste, gender and social exclusion further aggravate the already deplorable condition of these women. Hence, a strong initiative at the political, social and economic level is required to uplift these women. Furthermore, it is important that the respective governments identify competitive and high growth sectors such as tourism to integrate mountain women into the development mainstream.