UCS tries to combine business with conservation

UCS tries to combine business with conservation

Evi Mariani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The approach in which businesspeople build a tourist haven,
usually restricted to wealthy tourists only while disregarding
the poor condition of locals, is on the way out.

The owner of Umang Island Resort and Spa, near Ujung Kulon,
Banten, invited locals and people within the area of Ujung Kulon
National Park to join the Ujung Kulon Conservation Society (UCS),
which plans to develop local tourism, agriculture, fisheries and
conservation.

Former forestry minister Marzuki Usman was appointed president
of the society.

"Most locals there rely on the sea where fish are dwindling or
land that is not very fertile. Spa and resort owner Christian
Halim thought to assist locals by providing jobs and also setting
up small business ventures to help the economy," Marzuki said
recently.

For example, he said, the UCS would buy the catch of local
fishermen and use it most effectively.

"Not all the catch can be sold in the fish auction, so we will
buy fish and set up a cottage industries that can produce cat
food," he said.

The owner of the spa did not wish to establish a luxury resort
and spa to welcome rich tourists while locals could only watch
and did not receive any benefit at all, Marzuki added.

The room rate for staying at the resort ranges from US$88 (Rp
800,000) to US$150.

It takes a 1.5-hour journey by speedboat from the island to
reach Ujung Kulon National Park, where the endemic and rare
single-horn Javan rhinoceros (Rhinoceros sundaicus) dwells.

Because Umang resort will provide a program to visit the
national park, the owner has also invited the park management to
join UCS.

"We want to introduce the park to more people. We also have
program to help raise funds for the park," Marzuki said.

For example, in cooperation with the park, they would auction
the opportunity to name a rhino.

"For instance, Bill Gates could have a rhino named after him
by donating US$1 million. The money would be used for supporting
the park," Marzuki explained.

Ujung Kulon National Park, a world heritage site, receives an
average 5,000 visitors annually, of which some 30 to 40 percent
are foreigners.

The park, which occupies 76,214 hectares of land and a marine
area of 44,337 hectares, has all the estimated 60 rhinos in the
world and about 800 banteng (buffalo).