Opinions on Gorilla Trekking..is Fossey contradicted in death????

[emmajuk]

Hi Guys

After having recently fallen in love with Gorillas all over again I had started to look into the Gorilla trekking tours in Rwanda, Uganda and Congo.

Then i read a bit about Dian Fossey who seemed to be against tourists as Gorillas can catch flu etc.

But then....on her site it advertises and mentions winners of treks...that the foundation have sent people on

Sooo....are the treks positive? Surely without such tourists they could not fund the anti poachers etc

But....is it completely harmful to the Gorillas

I feel a bit sad that Fossey seemed to be against it but her charity in her name supports it...

discuss please as my opinion is totally divided

 

[Monty]

If the local people can not earn a living from them, they have no incentive to protect them.
Somebody earning their income from Gorillas will not poach them and will do all he can to protect the source of the income. It is the same with governments, they will not spend money stopping poaches if their is no benefit to the country.

 

[DavidBrown]

Hi Guys

I feel a bit sad that Fossey seemed to be against it but her charity in her name supports it...

discuss please as my opinion is totally divided

I'm not sure what Dian Fossey's final opinion of gorilla tourism was before her tragic death. I'm sure that you could probably find it in one of the books about her.

It seems indisputable that tourism has saved the gorillas. Rwanda went through one of the worst civil wars and genocides in recent history in 1994 and the gorillas were more or less protected. There are really nasty wars going on in the same region of Congo and Uganda also and the gorillas persist. My impression is that the gorillas are recognized as an irreplaceable economic resource because of the tourism.

I would recommend the book "In the Kingdom of Gorillas" by Bill Weber and Amy Vedder. They are ecologists who worked with Dian Fossey and fought with her over the need to set up ecotourism in order to conserve the gorillas and their ecosystem. The book records the history of how and why gorilla tourism was set up and how it is working.