Ecosphere in Spiti

Ecosphere is a social enterprise, working on the triple-bottom line of economic empowerment, conservation and development in the Spiti valley. By Ishita Khanna

Spiti, a world little known to most and yet slowly emerging from the depths of its ancient slumber, lies tucked away amidst stark brown folds and meandering rivers in the Trans-Himalayan cold desert belt of Himachal Pradesh. Sharing its borders with Ladakh in the north and Tibet in the east, Spiti shares stark ecological and cultural affinities to both the regions.

Extreme winters with temperatures as low as -30°C, arid landscape, limited vegetative growth and average altitudes fluttering around 4,000 metres above sea level typify the Spitian desert-scape. But don't be fooled by the harshness; it only adds further charm to the beauty of Spiti.

With its geological history dating back to half a billion years (remnants of fossils from the time whence Spiti was submerged under the ancient sea Tethys can be found with the help of a trained eye), and its religious and social history over 1,000 years old, Spiti offers varied insights of a rare kind.

Home to a purely homogenous Buddhist community, Spiti houses a population of a little over 10,000, which makes it one of the least dense populated areas in the country. Having remained isolated for a major part of the previous century, Spiti has only recently started to engage actively with the outside world.

The traditional lifestyle of the Spitian community was a form of subsistence agro-pastoralism which prevailed predominantly till about 30 years ago. Barter with its neighbours was an important feature of the economy but Spiti has undergone a major transition over the past two decades and has witnessed whirlwind changes in its economic patterns that have shifted towards a more cash-based economy.

However, Spiti's harsh climatic conditions, geographical isolation and limited natural resources do not offer many opportunities for cash-based incomes to the locals. Agriculture, which has been the mainstay of the economy, is also limited to only one crop a year due to the long and harsh winter and lack of moisture. Cash crops in the region are scarce and are primarily crops that have been introduced into the region from outside and not entirely conducive to the region's geo-climatic conditions. The development need in Spiti is the creation of alternate and sustainable sources of income for the local community, which provides adequate income-generating opportunities for the local populace and ensures conservation of its fragile natural and cultural environment.

Selfless help

While Spiti was undergoing a rapid transition and grappling under the pressure of finding solutions to its economic and environmental issues, a few individuals while revisiting the valley in 2000 were once again mesmerised by the magic of Spiti but at the same time were also alarmed by the developments taking place in the region.

Their concern for Spiti led them to initiate dialogue with some of the local leaders to try and find solutions to the development issues. While the individuals had backgrounds befitting their concerns, their jobs and locations restricted movement into Spiti. However, what started as a discussion in the Nono's (the King of Spiti) house in Kaza in 2000, about the problems plaguing the Spiti valley, slowly transformed into a social enterprise working on providing the locals with income opportunities with the broader objective of linking local livelihoods to conservation of Spiti's culture and nature.

In 2002, these individuals (Parikshit, Ishita and Sunil) decided from Muse (an NGO) to initiate work on establishing linkages of livelihoods to conservation as a means to address the development issues in Spiti and to proactively involve the local population in the same. While Ishita and Parikshit quit their jobs with the Himachal government, Sunil who was at the time living in Australia decided to come back to India, to pursue their common passion for the environment, mountains and its people. As a starting point, a project focusing on the conservation, commercialisation and propagation of Seabuckthorn, a medicinal fruit with immense economic and ecological value, was initiated. Over the past decades Spiti had witnessed large scale depletion of this resource as people extracted the plant for use as a fence and for fuel wood. This large-scale depletion was primarily due to the fact that Seabuckthorn had no commercial value attached to it.

Realising Seabuckthorn's ecological importance for the region, as it is a soil conservant and nitrogen fixing plant, Muse undertook a project to tap the commercial value of this wonder plant thereby attempting to impact an attitudinal change in the mindset of the locals towards their natural resources in general and Seabuckthorn in particular. The met with success and Muse was able to market Seabuckthorn and its products successfully, both within the local as well as outside markets. Slowly the initiative gathered momentum and led to the formation of Spiti Seabuckthorn Society (a body comprising local representatives), which now works in over 27 villages with 500 members. This programme was primarily targeted to benefit the women of Spiti, but with time it has come to interest and benefit each and every member of the society.

Tourism gets a chance

Attention was then diverted to other issues, particularly the tourism industry in the valley. Ishita who had done her Master's level dissertation on the impact of tourism on the socio-cultural, economic and ecological environment at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) found that Spiti's rich culture and unique landscape makes tourism a viable livelihood option.

But going by the way tourism had developed in other mountain economies, the growth of conventional tourism could pose quite a threat both to the regions unique culture and ecology as well as provide only marginal benefits to the local economy with the major chunk of the revenue flowing out of the region as tourism and its associated activities are largely managed and controlled by outside entrepreneurs. To prevent the negative outcomes of tourism and enable the development of responsible eco-travel in the Spiti valley, it was felt that a planned and strategic approach is essential to help conserve the ethos of the region while providing a memorable experience to the traveller and generating incomes for the local community.

After an in-depth visitor analysis to understand the preferences of the tourist and discussions with experts from the travel industry, Muse began working with the community on showcasing their natural and cultural assets through a range of niche products and activities. This entailed extensive training and capacity building of the local community to enable them undertake these activities as true travel professionals. Over the years a number of local youth have been trained as mountaineers, naturalists, interpreters, cooks, home-stay providers, etc and Spiti is now gradually being promoted as a responsible eco-travel destination.

Ecosphere is born

This was also the genesis of Ecosphere that aims at re-establishing the crucial link between the custodians of Spiti's natural and cultural resources and the outside world that is an inherent part of the transition that the new Spiti is undergoing.

Ecosphere endeavours to make tourism profitable for the community, its culture and ecology. The objective of the initiative is to develop unique, authentic and reliable tourism products and activities, link them to community livelihoods and conservation of culture and nature. This not only provides the community with a sustainable source of income but also serves as an incentive to conserve their unique natural and cultural heritage and environment.

All the activities/products have an inbuilt conservation charge which is ploughed back towards conservation and development activities in the region. Ecosphere is a local initiative and promotes everything local. The core philosophy is to encourage people visiting the region to have minimal impacts and contribute maximum to the local economy by buying local goods and services. Minimising the carbon footprint is an important area of intervention for Ecosphere, and there are projects being undertaken related to promotion of renewable energy in Spiti that enable visitors to offset their emissions.

Issues pertaining to energy, promotion of traditional crops and organic practices, revival of art forms and their promotion, development of greenhouses, construction of solar passive houses, etc, are some other important developmental and conservation based initiatives of Ecosphere in the Spiti valley. Through its various programmes Ecosphere not only generates income for the local community from the various livelihood interventions it has initiated, it also channelises all additional revenue back towards further capacity enhancement of the local community, conservation and development works in the region.

The journey, however, was far from smooth. Spiti's geographical isolation and poor communication infrastructure was one of the major bottlenecks. What would otherwise be achieved in a day or two in the city would take weeks and sometimes even months in Spiti. Adding a little more spice to this was the laid back mountain attitude and what in Spitian phraseology is called 'Tribal Time'. Spiti's extreme winter and dusty environs of a rugged back country make for a beautiful setting but a hard working environment. In the winter of 2003, two of the founder members of Muse (Sunil and Parikshit) met with a fatal accident, in which Parikshit lost his life and Sunil was critically injured. This was a major loss for the team and the work was nearly all abandoned. Ishita's commitment towards Spiti and the work however managed to keep the team together and ensured that the various initiatives being undertaken did not suffer. She too, had her tryst with calamities on numerous occasions. In 2004, Ishita had first-hand experience of the hostility of the region while visiting the Pin valley for a meeting. She woke up freezing the next morning to -20°C, five feet of snow and road blocks that would continue to disrupt all movement for the next two weeks. She eventually had to walk 32 kilometres to get back. What was to be a routine visit turned to be a long wait for the snow storm to wither and eventually the avalanches to stop blocking the roads.

On another occasion in the 2005, she was again in the midst of another natural calamity as the Pare Chu flooded the Spiti and the Sutlej rivers. Having to outrun the flood as she was coming back to Spiti was an eventful yet subtle reminder of the precariousness of the region and the risks of working here. After walking for 50 kilometres, she managed to survive the onslaught and got lucky with chopper evacuation from Upper Kinnaur.

These and some other minor issues such as no internet and mobile connectivity till 2007 (the land lines too are mostly out of order), limited electricity supply (on occasions two hours every alternate day) proved to be some roadblocks (not to mention actual roadblocks throughout the year) in hastening the work for quick results. However, Spiti's magic kept the motivation going and only increased the passion for the region and its people.

The writer is co-founder of Ecosphere