A British nurse who worked in the midst
of deadly bombings, explosions and
violence of World War II, tending to the
wounded
and the scarred, landed up in Simla after
the war, carrying with her reams of
remarkable stories about her adventures
in
another world. Many years later, when
little Ishita Khanna would sit spellbound,
listening to her Florence Nightingale of a
grandmother narrate her amazing stories
as a nurse and later as a social worker
in India with grave interest, little would
she realize that the seed of her
relentless passion for adventure was
being sown in those tales.
Growing up, while sitting in a classroom
at Wellham’s Girls school, Ishita would
often dream about adventure at her
doorstep.
The sheer thrill of climbing mountains, the
cool air of the meadows and the rolling
hills outside the city of Dehradun where
she lived meant much more to her than
most others the same age.
Ishita was born and raised in Dehradun.
From an early age, her mother would
encourage her to be independent and
discover the
outdoors. She would set out to trek in the
mountains – savouring the many joys of
the journey alongside a gradual
sensitization towards nature’s fragile
resources that coexisted delicately
alongside various forms of life.
“My various treks in the Himalayas
brought in a great reverence for the
mountains,” recalls Ishita vividly.
Not inclined towards a conventional
career, Ishita fondly remembers how the
family backed her in her efforts to pursue
her
passion without burdening her with
academic pressures. She came to
Mumbai for a master’s in social work at
TISS, a program
that exposed her to various development
and conservation needs and issues.
The professional program lent her a
better understanding of the various
social dynamics and development issues
and thus gave
her wider career options. However,
Ishita chose to work close to her place of
passion – in the mountains. She joined an
organization and began to work on
projects with the Himachal government.
A couple of years went by, and she was
getting impatient with the ways of
government functioning and this apathy
finally got
to her. One day, she walked out and
along with two of her friends plunged
into an independent venture, one that
Ishita
remembers came out of a shared
passion for the mountains.
The team began to look into various
development and environmental issues in
the mountains of Spiti. They explored the
commercial viability of seabuckthorn – a
berry found in these parts – and then
discovered other more sustainable areas
of
businesses. Efforts in areas such as
eco-tourism ensured they survived to
sustain their passion.
The Spiti Valley is an unforgiving, arid
region situated at about 10,000 to 17,000
feet above sea level where a misdirected
winter vacation can land you with the
rare experience of living inside the deep-
freezer of a refrigerator at minus 30
degrees.
Heavy snowfall leaves the region
separated from the rest of the country in
a silent breakaway, without any
insurgent efforts, for over half the year.
The government has subsidized basic
goods and services which are available
for 50%
of the price. The local communities have
grown used to the subsidies and recent
years have sometimes seen crops fail
here.
Ishita, through her organization
Ecosphere, has worked towards
improving environmental management in
these villages. She has
been on a mission, trying to make the
local communities self sufficient and less
dependent on subsidies and government
handouts.
Ecosphere has been collaborating with
other organizations in the region. Ishita
has made substantial efforts to grow
crops
through greenhouses, introduced
responsible travel for tourists and
persuaded the locals to understand the
perils of
neglecting the environment.
Ishita has been exploring renewable
energy options and solar passive homes
and has been smart with communicating
her ideas to
the locals. She tells people how they can
economically benefit from these new
options whenever she has struggled to
make them
see reason. One of the interesting
features of her work has been the way
she has managed to connect with a host
of diverse
people - the locals, their issues and also
the tourists and others who form an
important part of her business and social
clientele.
In 2008 Ishita was the MTV Youth Icon of
the year for her work. At 29, Ishita has
achieved what many people aspire to in
their lifetime. A matured head on firm
shoulders has also meant an unwavering
commitment towards her passion. Ishita
has not
only worked successfully in these
difficult areas, but she has connected
with her passion, sustained her interests
and
converted it to benefit a region that had
been lost in the wilderness.
When Ishita spoke to 6bridges, we were
curious to know how she had sustained
her yen for what she does. Despite the
physical
and economic hazards in her line of
work, Ishita has indeed been one of
those professionals who have been able
to grow, live
and sustain their passionate interests
over the years.
We found out from her how!
Interview with Ishita Khanna
6bridges: Tell us about your journey
from your childhood to your professional
degree at TISS to realizing this dream at
Muse/Sptitiecosphere as a social
entrepreneur.
Ishita:
I grew up in Dehradun and studied at
Wellhams Girls School. I wasn’t much for
studies as such and was usually a
backbencher
at school. I can say that academics was
something I wasn’t really interested in
and most of my teachers and parents
were
worried as to what this girl would do
when she grows up. I used to like going
outside - do the outdoors and trekking –
like
going to the mountains and stuff.
That was where my interests began
basically for the mountains and for the
environment. My treks in the mountains
brought me
close to the natural environment there.
Since the only subject that got me
interested initially was geography; I
wanted to
know more about the environment and
nature.
I wasn’t like one of those students who
know knew in class VIII what they were
going to do when they grew up - like
become a
doctor or an engineer etc.. That’s how it
began – I was more of an outdoor kind of
a person – a prefect for the adventure
club, and I had done my adventure basic
and advanced courses at the Nehru
Institute of Mountaineering.
I also did a Duke of Edinburgh award
scheme, which is now called the
International Award for Youth. I found
that that was
really good because apart from
academics it helped you excel in other
fields – you had to work on the skills,
work on some
amount of community service, you had to
play some sort of a sport which you
were good at, you had to have some
expeditions
which you had done. It had a holistic
focus, unlike the usual focus on
academic alone like most schools have.
That really helped me try and excel in the
particular things I was interested in.
Anyway that was how my schooling
happened.
Late, I graduated with a bachelor’s in
geography, like I said that was the only
subject that interested me in school, and I
wanted to more get into environmental
planning side. In the interim, I got through
TISS. That was a course that interested
me
and I felt that there could be a linkage
between looking at rural livelihood and
how one could link it up to the
conservation
of the environment. So I specialized in
the field called Urban and Rural
community development at TISS.
6bridges: When and how did it occur
to you that you might work in the
mountains some day?
Ishita:
Well it was something I always wanted
to do. I grew up in Dehradun which is
close to the mountains. I always loved
trekking
and being in the mountains. I always
wanted to be there - in the mountains.
6bridges:
Ecosphere grew from the work initiated
by Muse, an organization founded
individuals with a passion for the
mountains and the
environment. It now collaborates with
Muse. Tell us how it was formed?
Ishita:
I started Muse in 2002. Before that I was
working with the government at Simla
and we tried to push it with the
government to
try and work on this plant called
seabuckthorn which is a berry that
grows there. But you know how the
government works,
which is at their own pace. There had
been some research done on
seabuckthorn and there was one
scientist working there who
declared the seabuckthorn to be a
species that could not be
commercialized.
In China there had been a lot of work on
the commercialization of seabuckthorn,
and then the Indian government picked up
on
that and wondered if they could do
something with the seabuckthorn that
grew here. That’s when the scientist got
up and said
that it was the wrong species to be
commercialized.
But the same year in which we
discovered about this plant we got to
know that an industrialist in Ladakh had
started the
lehberry juice with the plant. He had used
the berry to make juice out of it and it took
some time to get it out into the
market. So, it was the right species
because he was commercially exploiting
it as well. We tried to push the case with
the
government but nothing really took of. So,
a group of us decided that why don’t we
do it ourselves. All three of us were
greatly passionate about traveling and
being in the mountains and stuff. There
was this friend of ours in Australia who
also
wanted come back and do something in
the mountains. So we called him and the
three of us started this.
It was a result of a mix of our common
interests and the experience we had
with the government that led to our
starting this
journey.
6bridges:So you moved from TISS
and worked with the Himachal
government for sometime. Tell us about
that.
Ishita:
I worked with this agency called
KAPAAT, where I got a campus
placement after TISS. I worked with them
for about 2 years. In
the organization I was based in their
eastern centre in Chandigarh and from
there I went and worked with the
Himachal
government, with whom they had a tie-
up. So I went to work with the Himachal
rural development department through
them. Then
something got going and there was a
huge project funded for Himachal
government. It was the first foreign
funded project for
rural development. It was basically on
linking women’s livelihood to environment
conservation: so it was environment
conservation through women’s groups.
I was made in charge of the
implementation of that but then it was so
frustrating because for one year, they
didn’t release
any funds, and it just remained in the
files. So, after a point in time, you
wonder what you are going to talk to the
communities about – that we must do this
activity but I don’t know why the
government is taking so long to release
these
funds. So that was really frustrating.
And that’s why we didn’t see a point in
continuing in this field with the
government.
That’s how we started our thing!
6bridges:
How difficult was the decision to move to
Spiti? Were there any moments,
conversations or events that acted as a
trigger? Was
it too difficult a choice at that time?
Ishita:
We were all young and passionate at
that point of time and you don’t really plan
too much when you are young and
passionate
about things. You jump into it and know
everything will fall into place, and you
don’t think too much. I did it then, but if
I had done it now I would have thought
about it and made a business plan etc
and would have never gone down to
doing it. So,
it kind of… what the hell lets just do it!
6bridges:
How did people around react to your
decision of starting a non-profit in a
remote area?
Ishita:
Most people were a bit shocked why we
wanted to go there. Especially, since it
was a far flung area with such limited
access.
I think that was a worry like ‘whats
wrong with you…have you guys lost it
completely!’ But then all of us were so
independent
that we didn’t think much of what our
families had to say to us. We just wanted
to go ahead and do it.
6bridges:
What were the initial challenges when
you started– you faced setbacks
including Parikshit at an early stage. How
did you cope
with the initial challenges at that time?
Ishita:
See, initially one if the main challenges
was to get the people together to start
working on it A lot of stuff had been
done
on seabuckthorn in the beginning and
they tried to mobilize the community at
that point in time and then it was sort of
left
midway.
It was a challenge to get the community
on our side. It was simple in that sense
because when we first went to Spiti and
asked whom should we speak to in the
community out there, they said there was
a ‘No-No’ out there who was the king of
Spiti.
So the first thing we did when we went
to Spiti was meet with him and discuss
the ideas. He was a very genuine and
down to
earth kind of a person who really wanted
to do something for his place as well. He
had known about seabuckthorn and
wanted to
do something on it. He said that he would
support us completely. So we got his
support right from the start, because we
didn’t have any money with us at that
time. We were lucky to get a project
funded by a German funding agency.
We got it by chance since we happened
to be there at the right time and place.
They had to get rid of their money and
they
found us and said okay, which is a rare
happening! But we didn’t have any
money to pay them for the berries that
they were
harvesting. We got a small amount from
them and just had enough money to set
up the processing facilities for this.
So we had to sell the pulp. The idea was
to pulp the berries and sell it to the berry
person. So once you got the money from
him, you were able to pay the
communities. It was quite a laughing
matter and everyone was making fun of
us that we were
working with women in five villages and
not getting paid for the work we were
doing. People wondered if we had lost it
completely! But we said we trust the No-
No and so we’ll do this. So that was a
major challenge at that time.
The other thing was that none of us had
any background in food processing, and
so we had to learn from scratch. Things
like
how do you make the pulp, preserve it,
transport it and prevent it from going bad.
Seabuckthorn is a berry on which not
much
research has gone into it. It has got lots
of medicinal benefits but it also has a
short shelf life. The berry once
harvested
has to be pulped in four hours flat. These
were some of the challenges in terms of
technical aspects.
6bridges:
How long did this period of challenges
last?
Ishita:
There have been challenges all along.
We don’t really have the background for
the kind of stuff we are doing. Right
now, we
are working on climate change issues
and renewable energy. So we are
constantly grappling with newer issues
and things which
are not really in our fields of
specialization. So either you overcome
the challenges through partnerships with
people who do
have knowledge of that or you figure out
ways to try and teach yourself.
6bridges:
You start with a certain plan and
objective and over time that evolves and
develops. How has the idea evolved in
your case.
You started with seabuckthorn and now
you are doing a lot more for that
area.
Ishita:
Initially when we started working in Spiti
we thought we will work for one or two
years and once we are successful we’ll
do
something else. But once you are there
you always come up with other issues
that you feel should be addressed. So
initially
when we started working on
seabuckthorn, it was just about this
particular berry and nothing else. In 2004
there were these
group of people who came in from Snow
Leopard conservancy who came looking
for partners in tourism and snow leopard
conservation.
They found out that we were working in
Spiti and were keen to partner with us.
We were also interested and were keen
to look
at some of the tourism issues in the
valley. During my masters, I had done a
dissertation on the impact of tourism on
the
ecological, social and cultural
environment of an area. That was
something we were looking at. Tourism
was building up in the
area but no revenue was actually
staying within Spiti. All that was left
about was garbage and the regular
consequences of
tourism. So we wanted to look at how
the locals could benefit from tourism
more.
We did a survey with the travelers as
well and one of the feedback we
gathered from them was that they
weren’t really getting
an insight into the local culture –
something which they really wanted to.
They wanted to stay with the locals and
see how
they live and what they do. That’s when
we started working on homestays and
also began working on tourism related
things –
like how livelihood could be benefited and
how could we link various conservation
issues to tourism.
Our objective from the start has been
that if you are able to link economics to
conservation, that’s the only way people
will
start showing interest in it. That’s the
reason also we started with
seabuckthorn, not because it has some
great medicinal
value and hence economic potential, but
more so because it is very good for the
ecology of the area and it binds the soil
and
fixes nitrogen. So for a cold desert it’s a
really good plant to have, especially
along the river beds where a huge
amount of
soil erosion that happens there.
6bridges:
Women have been generally constituted
the workforce in these parts. After you
started encouraging local
entrepreneurship
here, did you manage to get the men
onboard?
Ishita:
If you see, in most of the hill areas,
women do most of the work. Right from
the start we were looking to channelise
more
funds and generate more incomes. The
men would have never even come
forward to doing this. That’s because it a
very difficult
plant to harvest.
It’s very thorny and you have to go to the
fields early in the morning to harvest it.
It’s a very tedious process actually to
harvest it. In fact, one of the huge groups
in Spiti came forward and said they
wanted to do it because there seemed to
be a
good amount of money in it. They tried for
a few days and then they gave up. It
was hard for them. But the women are
persevering and they continued. Also,
because they don’t have too many
sources of alternate income for
themselves. It caused
a lot of issues in the families.
That’s because in the 2-3 weeks
seabuckthorn season, they would go off
early in the mornings to harvest the berry
and there
would be no one to look after the family.
The husband would have to get up and
look after the family in the morning and
run
the risk of people saying, “Oh God our
women are not here, what are you
people doing?” Women in Spiti are on the
whole are
outgoing and quite vocal.
6bridges:
So did you manage to change the gender
demographics of entrepreneurship in the
area?
Ishita:
I won’t say it had a huge impact. I would
think that women in Spiti are fairly
liberated. That didn’t affect that part as
such.
6bridges:
When you started out, social
entrepreneurship was not a common
occurrence in India. Besides, you were
planning to work in at
a place that was poorly connected and
had its own challenges. Were you
apprehensive at any time?
Ishita:
It slowly started to grow like a social
entrepreneurship model. We started off
like a typical NGO - you receive funds
and
then you work with what you got. After
sometime it got really frustrating working
like that. You go to the funding agencies
with a begging bowl asking for money so
that we can slog ourselves to work in
Spiti. There are not many benefits you
get out
of it but the attitude you get from them is
something you wouldn’t want to take,
and also they have their own agendas all
the
time that we’ll only fund this and we’ll
only fund that etc.
We said that doesn’t fit into the context of
Spiti at all. Also we wondered how long
could we carry on like this. We talk
about sustainability but what about the
sustainability of the organization. If you
want to continue working on the projects
and provide greenhouses and solar
passive houses to the people, you can’t
to do that if you cannot sustain yourself.
That’s
why slowly transitioned from an NGO
model to a social entrepreneurship one.
Also, the other thing we realized over a
period was that though in the initial
stages we got the local communities to
do the
marketing, we felt later that after a point
in time, they couldn’t do that. That’s
because they didn’t have any idea of
market dynamics at the international level
or even the dynamics in the urban
centres. Therefore, they were never
going to be
able to reach that level. They were
already occupied with the stuff they
were doing for their own livelihood. So to
expect
them to market it would have been a bit
hard. Not that it’s not possible, but it’s
very hard. That’s when we felt we could
help them with the marketing side of it.
6bridges:
And you tried talking to the hotels and
tourist agents earlier but they resisted
the home stay models as it impacted their
own revenue models. Is that when you
had to go out and market yourself?
Ishita:
Yeah, it was by default that we got into
the marketing the tourism stuff and now
its reached a level where travelers come
to
us and say that we want everything. We
tell them, “Ok we will organize everything
for you.” So it has moved into tourism
since there is a market demand for that
and so slowly it has transitioned into that
as we felt that the communities couldn’t
really do these things.
6bridges:
So is your revenue model woven around
seabuckthorn, marketing local products
like handicrafts etc and ecotourism?
Ishita:
See, the main revenue comes from
tourism. The seabuckthorn has been a
real challenge, that’s the first project we
started on
and yet it’s not been sustainable on its
own. There has been huge politics in the
seabuckthorn market. There was a lot of
politics involved. Sometime back Chinese
pulp started coming in, and the
seabuckthorn market has been very
unstable. We had
to transition from just selling pulp to the
lehberry person because he started
getting pulp from China. Then we had to
transition into making our own products
and then we were struggling to get our
products into the market. So, I mean it’s
has
been quite a struggle for us to get this
seabuckthorn thing completely
sustainable. It’s not very easy since
people are not
aware of seabuckthorn, its very sour
and has a very short shelf life. We’ve
had huge issues with seabuckthorn
actually. The
enterprise is right now supported largely
by ecotourism.
6bridges:
What should professionals keep in mind
before taking the plunge into social
entrepreneurship? What is the right kind
of
experience needed to work in this area?
Ishita:
I would tell you from my experience that
if we had given it a deep thought, we
might have never landed up doing it. I
would
go against the normal thing of planning
and thinking far too deeply. I believe a lot
of it depends on the passion quotient.
If you have the passion for doing
something, you will make it work it hook
or by crook.
Like if you’re going to think if I will get
money or not, is my business plan
breaking in 3-5 years or how am I going
to
sustain it etc…I mean we guys didn’t
work on salaries for about two years, so
maybe our model isn’t maybe the most
appropriate one to go by. It was just that
we wanted to do this, were passionate
about it and so we landed up doing this!
Whether other people would do this or
whether this model is replicable – there
are big question marks over those things.
6bridges:
How have your experiences and
interactions with the people in and
around Spiti had an influence on how
you look at life and
the world?
Ishita:
Spiti has very harsh conditions. So living
there reminds you how limited our
resources are, and how consumptive
our urban
lifestyles are. We just take everything so
much for granted. These are all non-
renewable resources like water etc. I
have
seen the way these people live and
realized how hard life here in Spiti is. Like
how hard it is to get water or get that
one
crop.
You realize how life is significantly
dependent upon the environment or how
delicate the ecological balance is.
For instance if the snowfall doesn’t
happen at the right time, it’s a drought
year for them.
Sitting in urban centers it doesn’t affect
us since in those places everything is
provided for, and so we don’t think of
these things. So these are some of the
things that I was influenced by.
6bridges:
What are the challenges you have faced
in trying to overturn conventional
practices about self reliance and
sustainability?
How much of a mental change towards
sustainability have you achieved?
Ishita:
At the end of the day, its dictated by
economics. Nobody really understands
environment. They say, “Isme hamara
kya faida
hai.” So its simple – if they are to profit
from it, they will do it, otherwise they
won’t. There is a notion that
communities look at long-term
sustainability. I haven’t seen that very
evidently. Instead, they look at immediate
benefits
and how much of it they are reaping from
work. Its like, “If I am getting a lakh to do
this, I will do it. If I am not
getting a lakh to do this, to hell with it
then.” Societies have become so
materialistic over the years that
economics is now
the most crucial thing.
If they don’t see economic incentive or
savings in what they are doing, there is
no way people will do it. The only reason
that the solar passive houses we
promote, have been successful is
because it cuts down the expenses and
enables the people
here to save money. Not that they care
about the amount of carbon that is being
emitted into the air. We tried showing
them
the correlation about the black carbon
that gets released and then returns to
settle on the glaciers and serves to
deplete
them (the glaciers) further. It did have an
effect on them, and they have digested
that cycle and sort of understood it. But
still, they believe that such a cycle would
take very long and they look at the
immediate needs more. So, they look at
immediate gains and losses more.
6bridges:
Your mom encouraged you to trek
outdoors at an early age and you spent
some time with your grandmother who
was a British
nurse in World War II. How has your
family been an influence?
Ishita:
My family has been really supportive. We
are two sisters, I have an elder sister,
and therefore we have been brought up
like
sons in the family. My parents have
always insisted that we have to stand on
our feet and not be dependent on
anyone. We were
always brought up like that. And my
grandmother did have a very large impact
on me since she was there during all the
formative years. We grew up with her
basically. She was a very adventurous
person, so I think I got a lot of inspiration
from
her. She had these great stories about
how she came into World War II and how
she worked as a nurse in Simla for
sometime and
then in Calcutta.
Then she got married to my grandfather.
He was with the railways and they kept
getting transferred to various places.
Everywhere they went, they started a
social project. My grandmother was
posted in Chennai for a long time, where
she and a
friend of hers started a project which is
still functional in a place called Madlapalli.
The project is to do with health and
children’s education and things like that.
I think I grew up with all these stories and
so they were an inspiration to me.
6bridges:
Do you want to replicate the model at
Spiti elsewhere in the country where it
might be useful, including the eco-tourism
model?
Ishita:
Our main focus has always been Spiti
and maybe the neighboring areas around
it. We have already started working in
places
like Lahaul and Kinnaur and we have
partners in Ladakh doing similar things.
Though this model can be replicated
elsewhere, I
would not like to be a physical part of
such a project elsewhere. Instead I
would be happy to partner other
organizations,
help with our inputs so that they learn
and apply it in their areas. I don’t think I
will physically locate myself elsewhere
to create a similar model.
6bridges:
At a young age, you have managed to
achieve a lot of things. More importantly,
you have managed to succeed in putting
your
passion into practice. Talking to you,
What is the big dream that you dream of?
Ishita:
Big dreams? No big dreams! Basically, I’d
like to stabilize what I am doing right now.
Right now me and my colleagues handle
activities like marketing etc. We would like
to hand over the ground level Spiti related
activities to the local team. We are
also looking at how we can expand and
plan other initiatives in this area itself –
which could include things like work on
renewable energy, climate change and
stuff. We are looking at ways how we
can earn. We are also looking at WWF
and the impact
assessment of tourism in the area.
For past few years it has been
increasing to quite an extent, and the
negative impact is becoming more visible
now. How we
can look at the policy for Spiti which is an
ecologically fragile area, and then look at
policy implications for the
government through that. So the issues
we are looking at are Spiti-specific and
the ecosphere and how it can address
some of
the negative impact of tourism in this area
– like climate change and stuff.
So in terms of big dreams, there are no
big dreams really! It is basically to see
how we can enhance our initiatives
focused
on Spiti and maybe the neighbouring
parts.
6bridges:
So, do you spend a lot of time in Spiti, or
how is it?
Ishita:
I am mostly there in Spiti in the summer
months April/May to October/November.
Then I come down the hills since it gets
very
cold in Spiti. It goes down to about minus
30 degrees and there isn’t much you can
do there. So, in that period, I am based
in Delhi, Dehradun or travel around a lot
the other time.
6bridges:
What is that thing that has given you the
most satisfaction in your work with Muse
and Ecosphere?
Ishita:
Personally, I feel there is a long way to
go and there is a lot to be done really.
Every day there are things that provide
you a lot of satisfaction. Everyday there
are things that provide you a lot of
satisfaction. There are so many
challenges –
like the one on seabuckthorn.
Overcoming a particular challenge is
again a big satisfaction, and when you
simplify it so that
the local community can do it – that is
also a big satisfaction. So there is no
specific thing but all these things that we
have being doing that have given me
satisfaction. Overall, it includes activities
that have an impact on the environment
and
help the local community through
increasing their income or reducing
expenses.
6bridges:
How do you plan to make the local
community to participate more? How do
you plan to hand over the reins of
activities to the
local community?
Ishita:
Right now our team consists of mostly
locals. Its been a gradual transition
where we have been trying to hand over
operations
to them. We have reached a stage
where 50-60% of the work is handled by
them at the local levels. So, though we
have been
wanting to hand over for a long time, we
realized that it’s a much more gradual
process than what we thought it would
be.
Their capacities have been really low,
and over the years their capacities have
built up and now we get shocked at how
fast
they are at picking up things. But yeah,
you have to give it a lot of time and effort.
6bridges:
How can somebody who wishes to help
Ecosphere and its cause make a
contribution?
Ishita:
There are various ways in which people
can get involved. One of the ways is if
you want to volunteer with us and if you
have
specific skill sets, then you can email us
and we can see how we can use those
skill sets.
6bridges:
What specific skill sets are those?
Ishita:
Like for instance, we need help in
marketing. We need help in planning and
business development and in putting
simple things
like posters or helping us in developing a
guide books for Spiti like a green guide or
green ratings and things like that
which we are working on. So, it’s a wide
array of things that one can work on.
And we require volunteers for these
things.
The other way someone can help is – if
you have a lot of money that you can
donate.
The thing is that people generally do not
like to donate their money because they
aren’t sure how it is going to be spent.
So, there is something called volunteer
travel. You can travel here and work on
the project if you want to, or you can
donate
money for the project. Volunteer travel is
something we found to be very
meaningful. You come to these areas as
a traveler,
work on a project and also contribute
money towards it.
We have these volunteers who come
and develop green houses. We are now
linking it up with the tourism industry. We
have got
really good responses – not from the
Indian market but from the UK market
where volunteer travel is a big thing.
They want to
come and travel, but they also volunteer
to do something meaningful. They come
and work on a greenhouse project with
us for 2
weeks, raise the money and work with
the local communities to develop a
greenhouse.
At the end of the day, they go back really
satisfied that they have helped build a
green house for the local community
which
is going to help them grow vegetables
even during the winters when it is minus
20 degrees. No green vegetables grow
in Spiti
otherwise, and everything has to be
brought in from Manali.
So there are added benefits of working
on a project like this which we found to
be much more meaningful – for them as
well as
for us too. But not everyone wants to do
that since some people may not have the
time. So there are different options for
different people. We also say that you
can simply come and travel as well since
all the revenue we generate goes back
to the
development projects or conservation
projects that we work on. So indirectly, a
traveler helps contribute to the
development
projects by traveling with us rather than
with a tour operator who just pockets all
the money and takes it out of the local
economy in any case.
6bridges:
So, have you faced competition in that
sense, from the local tour
Ishita:
There are very few local tour operators
in Spiti. I can count 2 such tour operators
as such who usually they have tie-ups
with tour operators in Manali and Delhi
who send them the tourists, and who are
the regular tour operators. Initially we
found that the tour operators were not
interested in any of the products like
home stays or any of the other things.
Now in
Europe, responsible travel has become
such a buzzword that clients now want
to travel responsibly, which is also a
problem
since every other tour operator now
claims he runs a responsible trip, which
they don’t. Responsible also means you
are
paying fair wages.
According to us, responsible travel
means much more. The problem now is
of everyone claiming to be responsible. I
think
that’s something that always will happen
in any industry whenever anything
becomes a buzzword, everyone tries to
follow and
get onto the bandwagon. But that is
something I guess we will have to deal
with. Tourism is more of a word-of mouth
kind of a
thing. You can come here, travel, go
back and suggest it to more people.
6bridges:
Thanks Ishita, we think you are doing
inspiring work that will motivate others to
follow or contribute through volunteer
travel and in other ways. We must also
congratulate you on a very impressive
website. The map depicted on the
website has
specific details and brings out your love
for geography, we reckon!
Ishita:
Well, thanks for the compliment and I
guess people now know where Spiti is
and that will help the cause of the
region.
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