Challenges of Collective Management in Community Tourism in Guatemala
BY DORIS EUGENIA MARTÍNEZ MELGAR/TRANSLATED BY SOPHIA OCAÑA
Community tourism gained momentum in Guatemala around 2005 when the State initiated permanent dialogues with indigenous peoples, incorporating discussions on natural resource management into public administration. In this context, community tourism emerged as a viable economic alternative for conserving these resources while generating income in rural and impoverished communities. Although there are no records or official data facilitating the analysis of the impact of these initiatives, my expertise, gained through accompanying this process, aims to document the struggles, difficulties, and successes of some iconic community tourism ventures in the country.
Elinor Ostrom’s Nobel Prize-winning theory of Common Pool Resource Governance provides a fitting theoretical framework for this analysis. Community tourism operates through collective management processes of common resources, such as the natural and cultural heritage that constitute the primary attractions of indigenous and peasant communities engaged in this productive activity. Personal reflections grounded in this institutional analysis seek to culminate in specific actions to be implemented by the Guatemalan State and accompanying international cooperation to ensure that community tourism truly becomes a tool for comprehensive rural development.
Over the course of 18 years, I have witnessed the formidable challenges and remarkable successes that rural communities have faced and achieved in relation to community tourism in Guatemala. This firsthand experience, framed within the institutional analysis of Common Pool Resource Governance (Ostrom, 1990), aims to provide recommendations for the intervention of external actors (the State and international cooperation) responsible for supporting and strengthening these processes. The thesis posits that community tourism is the most effective means of contributing to sustainable rural development in Guatemala. Achieving this requires addressing the socioeconomic disparities that still separate indigenous peoples and rural communities from these realities. It necessitates respecting and strengthening local and ancestral institutions for managing common resources (forests, water, landscape, culture) and facilitates the conservation of the country’s common natural and cultural resources, which constitute its primary tourist attractions.
Tourism in Guatemala
Community Tourism in Guatemala is closely tied to cultural, nature, and adventure tourism segments, which were experiencing continuous growth in the country before activities were halted due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In fact, Guatemala is globally recognized for its cultural and archaeological tourism segment. Tourism revenue in Guatemala in 2022 amounted to US$8.56 million, marking an 88.2% increase from January 2021, when US$4.55 million was generated. Before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, tourism revenue accounted for 1.23 billion dollars, representing 1.6% of the gross national product. It is estimated that each visitor spent an average of $479 on their vacations in Guatemala in 2022 (INGUAT 2023).
Despite the positive statistics regarding tourism revenue in the country, it is noteworthy that the main destinations are located in municipalities with high poverty rates, such as Antigua Guatemala (33%), Semuc Champey, San Agustín Lanquín, Alta Verapaz (89%), Panajachel, Sololá (36%), and Flores, Petén (84%), to name a few examples.
This reality underscores the need for strategic territorial-regional tourism planning that allows for the participation of social sectors traditionally excluded from the economic benefits of tourism, including host communities. Rather than merely serving as waiters, waitresses, artisans, or beggars in the country’s main tourist destinations, these communities deserve to be the direct beneficiaries of the enhancement of their natural and cultural heritage, which constitute the country’s primary attractions. Community tourism can be the means to achieve this.
Despite the potential of community tourism to achieve real positive impacts (economic, social, and environmental) in rural areas, there are no disaggregated statistics for this sector. We do not know how much of the overall tourism income is represented by nature, adventure, cultural, or community tourism segments. There is a lack of public and systematic data to make such calculations. Additionally, there is no national concept, officially endorsed by INGUAT, defining what community tourism entails in Guatemala, nor is there a record or location of existing community tourism ventures or their specific tourism offerings. Need, there is an ongoing debate in Latin America about the concept of Community Tourism. Enrique Cabanilla (2018) provides a thorough review of the concepts proposed from 1980 to the present, indicating, rather than a single concept, a series of conditions that sustainable tourism must meet to be considered community-based. These include: 1) A locally based economic model. 2) Can occur in both ancestral and non-ancestral communities. 3) Emphasizes the community territory as a fundamental element of tourism activity. 4) These territories can be located in very remote rural areas or peri-urban environments. 5) The main attraction is the relationship between culture and nature and the interaction between visitors and the host community. 6) Emphasizes the degree of control that the community has over the planning, management, and acceptance of tourism activities. 7) Can provide a multitude of tourism services. 8) There are no restrictions on the type of investment that can be community, mixed, or private, as long as the issue of distributing community benefits is respected. 9) Intimately linked to the concept of sustainable tourism and its three spheres of action. 10) Does not seek profit but rather positive impacts on the community, both economically and in terms of environmental conservation, as well as social impacts.
In the absence of a better conceptualization of community tourism, I venture to propose that community tourism in Guatemala should be a form of sustainable tourism planned, managed, implemented, monitored, and accepted by the host community itself, which distributes the economic gains and social and environmental benefits of tourism equitably among all its members. This management and tourism planning of the community territory are made possible by a social organization supported by a series of collective management rules through which common heritage resources that constitute the country’s main tourist attractions are appropriated and maintained.
In practice, there are national and foreign tour operators offering community tourism destinations, especially in Petén, around Lake Atitlán, and in the Green Caribbean region of INGUAT (Verapaces and Izabal). Although some of these entrepreneurs respect local organization and strive for the distribution of benefits to local communities, marketing, visitation, and dividends towards local populations are still in their infancy.
Doris Eugenia Martínez Melga, graduate in Ecotourism from the Universidad del Valle de Guatemala and professor in the Master’s Degree in Sustainable Tourism at the same university. Doctor and Master in Geography, University of Salamanca.
