Bored of her household chores and with an urge to learn something new, it was in March last year that Shruti Todankar, 33, from Kalinje, a village in Raigad district of Maharashtra, decided to join a “Mangrove” training programme with 25-30 other villagers. Until then, Todankar had joined the programme for two reasons — to enjoy the two hours of break from household work and find out if the training was really her cup of tea.
But six months later, Todankar, is part of a four women team leading the “Kalinje Ecotourism group”, taking tourists to see the mangroves and explain to them their and their importance. Todankar, who never studied English, boasts, “I know the botanical names of 11 types of mangroves in English, how to spot them, and explain their features and importance”. She and her team members still dedicate two hours daily to revise what they know and learn more about Mangroves in the area.
Kalinje Ecotourism is a part of a community-based conservation initiative taken up by the Mangrove and Marine Biodiversity Conservation Foundation of Maharashtra Forest Department for the upliftment of local communities and promotion of mangrove and marine biodiversity conservation. After training daily for six months at village mangrove sites — Harihareshwar and Shrivardhan beaches — on December 6, the team led 130 tourists from Mumbai on a Mangrove trail.
While around 30 villagers showed interest and took the initial training, 10 have become part of the tourism circuit. The first four women lead the mangrove trail, bird watching, traditional fishing. Two men received training from the National Institute of Oceanography in Goa for Mangrove kayaking and the remaining four take tourists on a boat safari.
Read more of this story in a report by Sanjana Bhalerao published in The Indian Express... (Link given below)
Such efforts can be made elsewhere too. Every state has so much to offer. - Editor
