Free of cost, trekkers throng crowded routes

December 16, 1999
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BY NAVIN SINGH KHADKA

Kathmandu, Dec.16:In what appears to be the aftermath of the official decision to scrap off trekking permit from three major trekking routes earlier this year, the number of trekkers in the already concentrated areas has shot up remarkably. While it may have local tourism entrepreneurs smiling, doubts loom large if the swelling trekking business will be an equally cheering news for the fragile ecology in the highland.

The Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation (DNPWC), according to Ganesh Raj Karki, Chief of Mountaineering Division at the Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation, has recorded 20 per cent growth of trekkers visiting different national parks. Of the 15 national parks and protected areas throughout the Kingdom, nine are in the mountain region.

After the Department of Immigration stopped issuing trekking permit (priced US $35 for a tourist per week) for Everest, Langtang and Annapurna regions from July this year, DNPWC is the only agency that records number of trekkers entering national parks and protected areas. Not necessarily, however, all trekkers enter national parks and protected areas while they are footloose in the adventure zone. Which means the number of adventure souls in the highland must have shot up further.

Bearing the brunt due to the uptick in the visitors’ graph are the already over-concentrated areas like Annapurna and Everest regions that saw above 54,000 and around 18,000 trekkers respectively in 1997. Last year, the total trekkers’ figure in all the trekking areas across the Kingdom reached above 112,000 – a 23 per cent growth in the previous year’s record. The Everest region, according to World Wide Fund Office here, saw around 20,000 visitors in the last 11 months..

Mounting human pressure on such tourism hotbeds have begun to result into adverse environmental impacts. Especially at places with no alternative energy source available that pave way for increased consumption of fuel wood. “With the growing number of teahouses in these regions, the consumption of fuel wood is seriously on the rise,” says Deepak Dhamala, General Secretary of Trekking Agents Association of Nepal (TAAN).

The sorry picture, according to a report of International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), is already reflected by the denuded forests at several pockets in the Everest region.

As alarming is the piled-up trash trekkers and expeditioners leave behind. A Spanish expedition team collected 1200 kilogrammes of garbage from the surroundings of Mount Annapurna I in May this year. Few months later, a German team came back from Khumbu region with above 30 kgs of used batteries found littered in the trekking trail. The clean-up team warned that the batteries could contaminate river waters in the region.

And now that trekkers need no trekking permit, conservationists have one more fear: Trekkers’ unrestricted movement could pose additional threat to the fragile Himalayan ecology. “Under the permit system earlier, trekking routes were specified,” says Jay Pratap Rana, Member Secretary of King Mahendra Trust for Nature Conservation that has been assessing the changed situation to prepare a report. “Since trekkers use their own routes now, it will have multiplier effect.”

In a bid to regulate trekkers’ movement, experts prescribe check-points to provide the visitors itineraries and explain them their code of conduct. But, doing that means money matters. Even though national parks charge Rupees 650 as entry fee to trekkers, the protected areas are still short of fund.

An analytical report by Ministry of Forests and Soil Conservation shows almost 43 per cent of financial gap for above US $85 million worth programs between 1999 and 2003 in 15 different protected areas in the country. Annapurna Conservation Area alone requires above US $15 million while the available fund is below US $10 million.

Sagarmatha National Park in the Everest region demands US $1.4 million while it has only US $350,000 cash in hand. Given the booming trekking business at certain trekking areas, one of the ways to bridge the financial gap at such places could be by bringing the local tourism entrepreneurs within the income tax net, says a senior official at MoTCA.

A revenue investigation team from Kanchanpur, according to the source, recently found many tourism entrepreneurs evading tax in the Everest region. “An average lodge owner in such area makes as high as five to six million Rupees in a year.”