RAINFOREST EXPEDITIONS - POSADA AMAZONAS, PERU

Finalist Community Benefit Award 2008

"Posada Amazonas - Ecotourism with Inclusion"

The Ese´eja Ecotourism Project that led to Posada Amazonas, is an initiative set up to demonstrate that a tourism joint ventures between business and a local community is not just a successful means of empowering the local community and conserving natural resources; it is also sound business practice.
At the heart of this project is a 20-year contract signed in 1996. The lodge is owned by the community and co-managed with Rainforest Expeditions. In return for its stake in the lodge, the community receives 60% of the profits. Decision-making is by consensus. Other fundamental concepts include the training of community members to occupy all lodge positions. Finally, the full management of the lodge itself will pass to the local Community in 2016.
Community members can de directly involved in the project as staff members or guides, or indirectly as suppliers. They can also be involved as decision-makers on the Control Committee. At any given moment, more than 50 families are involved in any of the three divisions.