The Protection of Natural and Cultural Landscapes through Community-Based Tourism: The Case of the Indigenous Kamoro Tribe in West Papua, Indonesia

Abstract

Community-based tourism (CBT) aims to offer responsible travel to natural areas, conserving the environment, sustaining local communities’ well-being, and promoting environmental and cultural education. The long-term sustainability of CBT depends on its ability to enhance local livelihoods while protecting natural landscapes. For the Kamoro indigenous tribe in Papua, Indonesia, CBT offers a way to engage with the capitalist world on their own terms while preserving their customs, traditions, and ecocentric worldviews, and sharing them with tourists interested in their culture. However, as evidenced by many failed CBT initiatives, it is not always a desirable or viable path for development due to numerous barriers faced by communities and the potential negative impacts of tourism. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the Kamoro people’s attitudes towards tourism, the barriers to engaging in tourism, and their concerns about its impacts. Semi-structured and in-depth interviews were conducted with community members and local organizations. The results show that although local people view tourism as a viable economic alternative, they face significant challenges, including a lack of trained human resources, infrastructure, financial support, tourism knowledge, government backing, and cooperation among local stakeholders, among others. While tourism development does not always guarantee the protection of natural and cultural landscapes, a community-led initiative supported by the government can serve as a barrier against the engagement of less sustainable industries controlled by external agents, which could have far more serious negative consequences.