Tourism, Change, and Continuity in the Mount Everest Region, Nepal

The Sherpa-inhabited Mount Everest region of Nepal has become a leading center of Himalayan tourism. This article examines the increasing role of tourism in the Sherpa economy and assesses changes in landuse, environment, and culture. As a result of tourism, the standard of living of most of the popu- lation has risen without severe environmental or cultural effects. Increasing regional differentiation in wealth, inflation, out-migration, and changes in pas- toralism and forest use may have long-term adverse effects. Efforts are now under way to address some tourism-associated environmental problems. THE high Himalayan regions of Nepal have become the foremost center of mountaineering and trekking in Asia. Small-scale adventure tourism links this once relatively remote part of the world with the global economy and provides new opportunities for economic development. The change is most strikingly evident in the Mount Everest region, where the prosperity of the Sherpas contrasts sharply with the living standards of nearby peoples who have not become involved in tourism. Various adverse effects of tourism on the local society and environment have been widely reported, and one consequence was the establishment of Sagarmatha (Mount Everest) National Park in 1976. Although tourism has transformed land and life in the Mount Everest region in some ways, many reports have exagger- ated the severity of the effects of tourism and have underestimated Sherpa adaptiveness, ingenuity, and cultural resiliency. This article examines how tourism has become a source of local economic development in the Mount Everest region and the effects of this economic change on local landuse, environment, and culture. The observations pre- sented here are based on extensive interviews with local residents, religious and political leaders, national-park administrators, managers of trekking agencies, tourist guides, and tourists during more than three and a half years of fieldwork conducted on eight research expeditions between 1982 and 1992.