I recently met someone who had organized a conference in Pokhara entitled International Conference on Accessible Adventure (ICAA). From what he told me, it all sounded very positive from a business prospective. Americans with reduced mobility alone are spending over $13 billion a year on travel. That is a hell of a lot of tourist dollars which Nepal is missing out on. But hang on a minute. Will the average person with reduced mobility want to head to a country known for its steep mountain landscape and notorious for its bad roads and airports?
I was told about some people who trekked up to Poon Hill, visited Chitwan, went paragliding, kayaking etc while missing limbs, being sight impaired or suffering from other debilitating afflictions. But on closer inspection, these amazing people are veterans and ex-policemen with disabilities gotten in the line of duty. These are not your average ‘mobility challenged’ people. To my mind, people who are mobility challenged are not only those severely affected, but also those from among a growing number of retiring baby boomers (those born between 1946 to 1964) who have reduced mobility due to age and are not necessarily officially termed ‘disabled’. Many of these people now have the time and financial means to travel. But they are not, on the whole, mountaineers, trekkers or adventure tourists.
So let’s not focus too much on the big adventures, let’s focus on accessibility on a more mundane level. Is it too much to ask for ramps in hotels, handrails in cafes and bars, larger bathrooms, disabled-friendly toilets in public places such as the TIA, and in government offices? It has been, I believe, the aging baby boomers in developed countries who have been pushing for better accessibility on transport, in public buildings, schools, housing, hotels etc. But who is pushing for better accessibility for the elderly and the disabled here in Nepal?
There are two strands to this issue of accessible tourism: the rights of the mobility challenged person, and the possibility of a new, prosperous source of revenue for the country. The size of the potential tourist market cannot be denied, but with less than one million tourists currently visiting Nepal, can the Nepali infrastructure cope? And can Nepal develop its infrastructure to such an extent as to entice this new tourist to come in the first place? Perhaps more importantly, should Nepal develop infrastructure to meet this demand at the expense of infrastructure for its own citizens?
In a country where it’s often a struggle and a bit of a trek for able-bodied people to walk along the sidewalk (if there is one) of the capital city, is it possible to meet the challenges associated with providing disabled-friendly accessibility for its own citizens as well as visitors?
There are people working very hard for the rights of disabled Nepalis, both in local and international organizations, and I wonder what they think of the idea of accessible tourism. True, at the ICAA, it was mentioned that highlighting disability in any way is a positive thing, and that accessible tourism will open up employment opportunities for disabled Nepalis. The conference also included a Mayors’ Panel, where city mayors came together to learn and share what is happening in their city with regard to accessibility. This, I thought, was an invaluable addition to the conference. Unfortunately, only three mayors from the whole country found the time to attend.
Accessible tourism could be the start of something really innovative and progressive, benefiting everyone. Or it could just end up benefiting those already in the tourism sector while the rest of us continue to show signs of age related reduced mobility, and continue to climb over rubble, struggle to get onto public transport ad nauseam…
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