Episode 5: Community tourism. What does good community tourism look like and can we measure its benefits?

Sponsored by ⁠⁠⁠⁠Lemongrass⁠⁠⁠

Holly and Richard discuss the benefits of community tourism and how to measure it, with guests Manisha Pande, Founder and Managing Director of Village Way and Kelly Galaski, Senior Director, Operations & Head of Impact at Planeterra.

In this episode, we unpack:

• Why some models work better than others
• How to put systems in place to avoid the dangers of tourism in rural areas 
• How to create impact through community rather than for community
• How to establish a constant dialogue to keep generating positive impact for a community 
• How to create an impact measurement and monitoring and evaluation tool
• How to monitor the impact of community tourism on an entire village or community 
• How to create replicable community tourism structures
• Why community run and operated tourism can lead to a better guest experience 
• The importance of communities not becoming over reliant on tourism, and how to prevent this happening
• The less expected benefits of community tourism

“The success lies in giving the communities collaborative ownership over what they are creating and offering to guests.” Manisha Pande

“We did our homework in what would have the best impact and we chose a model that works with an entire village rather than set up homestays.” Manisha Pande