Financing Strategies For Community-Based Tourism Development in Ambon City.

Abstract

Communitiy-based tourism could increase local income and at the same time maintain the culture, arts and way of life of surrounding communities.The government (the public sector) and the community must be equally involved in implementing community-based tourism. The government main role in the torism policy is to provide ease of access to various tourism resources. The private sector main role is in providing investment. The local communities can be empowered by their participation such as through the creation of unique souvenirs, performing art and traditional culture and to prepare the houses for tourists as homestay accommodation. The purpose of the research is to study the financing of community-based tourism development in Ambon. Findings of the analysis are : 1) the role of government shoud be increased through friendly investment policy and sufficient government budget, 2) increase in private financing done through the public private partnerships, 3) communication, coordination and cooperation among local government and tourism entepreneurs need to be improved, 4) communities around the tourist objects can not yet utilize the potential of tourism as a source of their income so capacity building for them is a must, 5) community can take advantage of the national program of tourism self empowerment (PNPM Mandiri Pariwisata) and “Kredit Usaha Rakyat” program for improving the utility mentioned so as to increase their welfare, 6) there are six financing strategies for community-based tourism development in Ambon that can be implemented in 2011-2016, namely : a) build a profitable collaboration between government, private sector and community, b) increasing the role of government and the private sector in developing tourism, c) improving people’s welfare around the tourist objects, d) enforcement the conducive investment policies, e) Improvement and development of tourism cooperation between local stakeholders, regional and international, and f) the development of marketing systems and integrated tourism promotion.