Eco Tourism And Friend With Principles (Part 1)

1. Eco Tourism:



A fortnight ago I asked some friends about eco tourism and mentioned my plan to go to one. The immediate response was " are you going overseas or in Malaysia. If in Malaysia I don't know where to suggest. Besides, I know that you often go back to your hometown in Kedah. Thats to me is eco tourism enough. Your kampong still have birds that sings in the trees and bushes arround your compound. The well near your house is still well kept and the water taste better then some mineral waters. I also know from old visits that some plots of padiland near your house was not irrigated by government irrigation project, and uses rain water for planting and bats droppings as fertiliser. Well, thats eco tourism and organic padi at its best. And, of course I still remembers that vipers and cobra roam your backyard after the first rain of the season."

Well, come to think of it,lots of what my friend said is true. And, economically thinking - Kedah, the rice bowl of Malaysia, just a few decades ago, was producing organic padi (rain water for planting and natural waste from bat droppings as manure). The production was once a year. But even once a year,with the demand and high price for organic foodstuff, the return ie RM wise, could be better than todays return of double or tripple croppings. This is so because, the present double or tripple croppings demand very high input cost in term of chemical fertilisers, chemical pesticide, and the continuos R&D and other efforts to fight the ever resistant pests, etc. And, of course healthwise too. Ignorant farmers nowdays are expose to x number of unknown chemicals which they handle just like mineral waters ( of course not to the extend of drinking it, except for a few isolated instances).

In short, technological and R&D advances in term of chemical pesticides, chemical fertilizers, diesel tractors,etc, result in much more produce, but moneywise, after taking into account the seen and unseen costs, does it fetches more RM than the organic padi of years gone by?