Tourism sustainability from a territorial perspective of ECLAC, the complete picture of the Micha reality
The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) published the document Tourism sustainability from a territorial perspective, which analyzes the Costa Rican, Panamanian and Dominican context in light of destination management indicators, proposed by the same document.
SEE: http://repositorio.cepal.org/handle/11362/69110
In this writing, and for reasons that seem obvious to me, I am going to refer to the analysis made by the writing of the Miches destination, and I will share with you in advance that I think it is accurate but incomplete.
While the indicators provided by the ECLAC document could feed into a smart tourism system and guide the comprehensive management of our tourist destination, it would be interesting to know the detailed aspects that impact each of the indicators and to reaffirm or provide feedback on them according to the specific objectives that are established. This, in principle, seems to me an excellent contribution from ECLAC. However, I must say that I am surprised that Miches only achieves an unsatisfactory performance in all the tourism sustainability indices measured by the entity.
In this spirit, I have been encouraged, with complete humility and respect for the professionals who worked on the document, including admired and beloved teachers such as Lissette Gil, to complete this analysis, with the aim of offering a perspective, from my point of view more in line with reality, of what is happening today in our beautiful destination of Miches.
I cannot understand the reasons for the loss of 75% of Miches’ cultural heritage, especially since hotel development began less than five years ago, and we have had 800 rooms in operation for only two years. Furthermore, I have lived in Miches since 2010, and since then I have continued to enjoy the same cultural expressions: the stick dance festival of Francia Amparo (supported annually by the Tropicalia Foundation), the singing to the Virgin Mary by the Bastardo family, the bullfights of Arroyo Santiago, the amazing schooners of Robert (five-time National Crafts Award winner), the wooden saints and canoes of master craftsman Genaro Reyes Cayuco (a source of pride for Miches and the Dominican Republic), the Taíno pieces of Juan El Artesano, and the coconut jewelry of Rosa, Milagros, and La Mella.
The analysis carried out by ECLAC does not mention that the hotel sector represented by Promiches, in alliance with the Ministry of Tourism and the Municipal Directorate of El Cedro, has made important efforts to organize Playa Esmeralda, including the orderly inclusion of the community in the tourist activity, through the establishment of a Handicraft Market, although we must admit that the process to put it into operation has taken much longer than we would have liked.
It should be added that, as a result of tourism development, Miches’ cultural heritage is being promoted with options such as the rice route in El Cedro, the cacao route in Canducito, the Casa Típica de Doña Ana (more successful than ever), enjoyed by tourists from Club Med Miches; the traditional route to Arroyo Santiago, the first whale watching tour from Miches, and the first tour to Media Luna. Isn’t this the preservation of cultural heritage and the development and promotion of cultural businesses?
Social engagement has been a major challenge throughout my approximately fourteen years working in Miches, and the ECLAC document aptly points this out. What the analysis fails to mention is that two years ago, the Miches City Council, with the support of the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Development (MEPyD), created the Miches Municipal Development Council. This council is comprised, according to the law, of leaders from the various sectors and subsectors that make up Miches society. Through this council, the Municipal Development Plan was designed, and the municipality’s investment priorities were defined.
Currently, the Miches Municipal Development Council is participating in the design of the Municipal Land Use Plan, along with local and national authorities. Isn’t this a significant step forward in terms of social engagement and community participation in management structures, one that is worth at least mentioning, let alone acknowledging?
A key challenge in this essential land-use planning process is aligning the regulatory policies developed under this new Municipal Land-Use Plan with those of the existing Tourism Land-Use Plan (POTT). The Ministry of Economy, Planning and Development (MEPyD), the Municipal Council, and the Ministry of Tourism (MITUR) bear a significant responsibility at this time to ensure that any approved measures are functional and not contradictory, lest a planning instrument ultimately become an obstacle to the much-desired economic and tourism development of Miches and El Seibo.
ECLAC, in its document, opines that investment and its impact on the local economy, employment, and MSMEs are unsatisfactory in Miches. I think—and I remain open to the possibility of being wrong—that this conclusion doesn’t take into account Miches’s starting point. Miches is a municipality located in the fifth poorest province in the country and is, very likely, the main transit point for human and narcotics trafficking to North America, or at least among the main ones in the country. The construction of the Uvero Alto-Miches and Miches-Sabana de la Mar highways alone has brought about a substantial improvement in the quality of life for the people of Miches. I can tell you this from experience, having been there before, during, and after their construction. The improvement of school infrastructure, the development of communications (telephone and internet), and access to potable water throughout the municipality are also significant. You have to consider what it means to go five months of every year without water, and you have to consider what it means for a family when that no longer happens. The construction of the Miches pier, the renovation of the Miches hospital…
With the payment of hotel and infrastructure taxes, the municipalities have directed investments that have improved and developed the municipality: today we have more trucks collecting garbage, better government offices, a new municipal park, a boardwalk and even a municipal funeral home.
You have to see what it means to spend five months of every year without water, and you have to see what it means for a family's life that this no longer happens.
Since 2018, the Tropicalia Foundation has been running a fund to support tourism and tourism services entrepreneurship, in partnership with Banco Adopem, called “Miches Emprende.” More recently, Miches Development Group, which is developing the Maralda hotel and real estate project, is implementing the “En Miches Hay Futuro” initiative, which highlights the importance of education and training to prepare young people to take advantage of new opportunities in tourism development and improve their quality of life.
In this new context, starting in 2015, new businesses have flourished and new options for the development of individuals and their families have emerged, who no longer have to go to Santo Domingo or Puerto Rico to make their dreams come true. This has led to the emergence of ventures such as: Montaña Redonda (which already existed but not on the scale it exists today), Restaurante La Topora, Asadero Jaqueline, Restaurante Al Coco, Restaurante Rajanoris, Restaurante El Muelle, Rancho Wild District, Ruta de Cacao de Canducito, The Carpia Tours, Parador El Limón, Parador La Cotorra, Mercado Artesanal del Muelle de Miches, Hotel La Costa and Rancho Tío Pepe.
Water management is classified as “Unsatisfactory Performance”; however, thanks to public-private planning, we are in the midst of developing a long-term solution for the supply of drinking water that eliminates dependence on groundwater for the hotel zone. The public investment to make this possible amounts to 1.33 billion Dominican pesos.
Certainly, this effort must be complemented by constant monitoring and recovery actions in the upper basins of the rivers that supply us, and the vision of the Dominican government, along with that of other stakeholders, should be directed toward this end. The private sector has made efforts to measure water quality in certain wetlands and analyze the water situation in specific areas; however, it is necessary to delve deeper in this same direction. There is no doubt that we will progress faster if international organizations support us. I would propose that ECLAC support us with a diagnostic assessment of the current state of the tributaries and/or a characterization of solid waste in the municipality with a five-year projection, which would allow us to define the necessary infrastructure for the proper and responsible management of solid waste. We already have quotes for this, and it is a matter of identifying the resources to move forward.
I would propose to ECLAC that they support us with a diagnosis of the current situation of the tributaries and/or a characterization of solid waste in the municipality with a 5-year projection, which would allow us to define the necessary infrastructure for the proper and responsible management of solid waste.
However, what has surprised me most about the ECLAC document is the low rating for the indicator related to tourism and environmental conservation. This has been the component of our work plan to which we have dedicated the most time, effort, and resources. And, assuming a very high risk of being wrong, I will venture to say that Miches, and specifically Playa Esmeralda, must be the only hotel site, and the only destination, that has a functional Coastal Management Board—that is, one that meets and has a work plan in place. We have made serious and decisive progress in designing our Coastal Management Plan, and even while it is still being designed, we have implemented components of the Plan that we believe cannot wait, such as the Miches Sea Turtle Monitoring and Protection Program. Prototortoise, which is among the most robust sea turtle conservation programs in the country.
I don’t mean to imply, not for a moment, that we don’t have environmental challenges in Miches. What I mean is that the failure to mention these efforts in the analysis conducted by ECLAC strikes me as a difficult omission to understand in a study of the management of an emerging destination, given that it ignores the arduous effort undertaken for years not only by the private tourism sector in Miches, but also by a large group of people at all levels, from the national and local public sector, the Miches community, and the local business ecosystem.
We do not feel represented by the figures published by ECLAC; however, we recognize the value of the tool they share and aspire to closer collaboration, which would give us the opportunity not only to share opinions bilaterally, but also to share the burden of transforming a harsh, marginalized, and challenging social and economic reality into a tourist destination capable of contributing to the national offering, because it takes into account the lessons of the past to do things right from the start.
