People-First Tourism Lab Blog

In competitive markets access to customers is often controlled by retail monopolies. In those situations, small and micro-businesses recurrently face great barriers to make their goods and services visible to potential customers. The control exerted by intermediaries is often due to customers’ lack of information about suppliers, or because of excessive complexity of supply. At its core, retail monopolies are dependent on information imbalances, and therefore, such situations can be addressed with information-based solutions that improve info flow between suppliers and their potential customers.  Recently, advances in information and communication technologies (ICTs) have created innovations that can moderate large and complex sets of product offerings and make them available to customers in efficient ways. Often, these solutions have taken the form of web marketplaces where micro-entrepreneurs can offer their services to desiring customers. It is now possible to sell exp...

An individual’s level of self-fulfillment depends not only on personal factors, but also on the strength of their support systems – social capital.  These support systems can range from people in the community to family members, and from public agencies to religious affiliations. These supportive entities are known to provide resources, information, and opportunities to individuals with vulnerable livelihoods.  However, research has also shown that community networks can promote social norms that hinder these individuals’ autonomy and self-fulfillment.   In this study, we examined the support networks of under-resourced tourism micro-entrepreneurs in select rural communities in North Carolina.  Transcripts from ten structured in-depth interviews conducted between August 2012 and March 2014 were examined using an approach in which we identified themes from studying the data.  We used a method of constant comparison between authors to arrive at a triangulated...

Tourism is highly advocated as a tool for poverty reduction in both developed and developing countries. Increased tax revenues and employment, and improved infrastructure are often cited as benefits from the growth of tourism.  However, tourism is also often criticized for cultural commodification, leakage of economic benefits, displacement of people from their original habitats, limited participation of host communities, as well as the uneven distribution of benefits.  Tourism micro-entrepreneurship is said to be a good solution to these problems – because micro-entrepreneurship creates income earning opportunities with low entry-barriers appropriate to under-resourced members of the host community.  Moreover, with their involvement in tourism, these community segments gain a place in community decision-making and exert pressure for tourism to develop in more equitable and sustainable ways. Micro-entrepreneurship is related to the definition of self-employment - perf...

A longstanding goal of conservation initiatives has been for the development of projects that exhibit long-term sustainability without dependence on foreign funding.  Additionally, recent research has shown that conservation initiatives with a traditional ‘command and control’ approach tend to undermine the livelihoods of local populations and the economic sustainability of forest-dependent communities, therefore failing to succeed in the “triple bottom line” approach to sustainability.  We propose that Forest-based tourism micro-entrepreneurship through People-First Tourism may provide a suitable alternative to large-scale top down approaches.  People-First Tourism provides dignified and sustainable livelihood alternatives to small-scale entrepreneurs in tropical forest communities by empowering them to support their livelihoods through innovative tourism opportunities.  For example, in the context of the Caatinga forests of Brazil, it hopes to accomplish three ma...

It has been almost a year since People-First Tourism (P1T) was in Brazil working with the NGO Humana Povo Para Povo to recruit local entrepreneurs for the first P1T network outside of the United States – Humana Sisal, Bahia, Brazil . From that intense week we clearly remember the barrenness of the land, the incredible hardships of everyday life, and, most strikingly, the kindness of the people we met and their paradoxical “joie de vivre” in the face of it all.   The complexity of our experience is illustrated in a short video on P1T’s Youtube channel; particularly in the genuine communion we felt while we danced with a group of sisal harvesters one night after a long and hard day’s work (an extraordinary day for us, just another day for them). Among the aspiring and inspiring entrepreneurs we worked with that week, Felipe dos Santos Almeida stood out due to his charisma, his authenticity and his desire to make more of his life.  Felipe was an engaged community m...

Hey, What do you guys think? We here in the P1T lab have reworked the definition of People First Tourism through an iterative process, honed by the experiences we have had in the field over the last year. A week ago we took the various definitions of P1T and analyzed them for their key components. We added to this our understanding of the underlying principles of P1T, wrote and rewrote our own definitions in teams and then as a lab team produced a "final"(?) statement of what P1T means in one sentence. That statement appears at the end of this blog. It is vital that we get more input. Please read it carefully and share with us your thoughts about this one sentence statement. We want to have a single statement defining P1T to use in all of our communications, papers, posters, grant proposals, reports, publications, and documents. So, let me know here what your thoughts are. People-First Tourism is a global partnership among tourists, the university and with individuals...

As People-First Tourism rapidly spreads through North Carolina and is about to expand to different states and countries, developing countries are witnessing the uttermost signs of Human Rights abuses, poverty, lack of primary education, health and other basic living standards advocated by the UN. Tourism could play a crucial part in eradicating all these deficiencies because it holds considerable potential in creating jobs, boosting livelihoods through visitation of natural and cultural resources.   Here in Iran, people are suffering from political issues that directly or indirectly have affected their daily life. Also, government leaders are so conservative in developing systems that may intervene their control over diffusion of information. In addition, lack of availability of information and trust between marginalized groups and city dwellers have led into intense isolation, difficulties and disparities. But presumably, People-First Tourism and its unique IT system coul...