BUSINESS PLAN

“AVITURISM AT CASA CLÚ 2023”

Training local guides and creating a birding experience at Casa Clú community garden San Ignacio, Banderas Bay, Nayarit.

Summary

After almost a decade of joint work between Casa Clú and our organization in environmental education and the development of a community of birdwatchers in San Ignacio, it is time to take our interest in conservation and community development to the next level. With this project we seek to develop the skills of 3 local youth who will serve as bird watching guides in a community garden that will allow them to carry out unique experiences of bird watching and contact with nature from their own garden, inviting local and international visitors. dignifying the community of San Ignacio and promoting and creating a success story in the conservation of birds and biodiversity, creating economic and social well-being.

Background

About Clu House

We are a Civil Association located in the rural area of San Ignacio Nayarit, Mexico. We are dedicated to creating and maintaining a playful, ecological, and cultural space where children can play, have fun, and be motivated to develop their own potential in art, sports, and any aspect of their lives they wish to explore. Our methodology consists of maintaining positive feedback, active listening, respect for oneself, our colleagues and nature, allowing the healthy expression of feelings. Casa Clu was born organically in San Ignacio, thanks to the desire and need of the children themselves to have a safe space where they can play. From the year 2013 La Casa Clu A.C. opens its doors for all the children of San Ignacio and the surrounding communities to participate and strengthen the values of: RESPECT, TOLERANCE, PERSEVERANCE, GRATITUDE, SIMPLICITY, NOBILITY, HONESTY, EQUALITY. We want to continue working to make a real change for the future.

The bird watching activity began in the community of San Ignacio from 2014-2'015 in collaboration between Casa Clú and the San Pancho A.C. Bird Observatory (SPBO). with the support of the International Rotary Foundation through the project "Development of Capacities for Conservation in coastal communities in the south of Nayarit Mexico". Over the course of six months, multiple workshops were held with children and young people to introduce the concept of bird watching as a playful-recreational and learning activity in a conservation context opposed to the prevailing view (in this and other rural communities in conditions of marginalization) of extractive use of self-subsistence and even change the habit of using slingshots. This with a future vision that bird watching could be an economic activity that favors sustainable community development and contributes to the well-being of as many people as possible in order to achieve a change in the behavior of activities such as buying and selling birds. songs on the road that are some of the activities that characterize this community and cause controversy with tourism development and even the fact that people buy exotic bird species and then release them, without knowing that these birds can not only transmit diseases to birds but in many cases, widely documented, become urban pests and a threat to local biodiversity. Although the result of the workshops was transformative in some of the young people, the support of more members of the community to support the integral work of Casa Clú

In this new phase, 5 years later, Casa Clú and the SPBO are working with a group of members of the Casa Clú work team who will serve as volunteer facilitators in the development of the implementation strategy for a comprehensive bird watching program in the community of San Ignacio, which will include both carrying out environmental education activities with the children, youth and adults of the community as well as part of the grassroots activities in the organization.

In a first stage of capacity development, the 5 Casa Clú facilitators received a 40-hour introductory course as Nature Tourism Guides. Work was also carried out on the realization of a work plan that includes both the implementation of an environmental education program using as a reference the manual "Celebrate Urban Birds in Mexico" in collaboration and with the guidance of the Bahía de Banderas chapter of the Urban Bird Program.

Vision

The community of San Ignacio makes a sustainable community use of wild birds and their habitats through bird watching as the main engine promoted by Casa Clú..

General objective:

Improve the conditions of self-sustainability of Casa Clú and the community 

Specific objectives:

Carry out a 40-hour nature tourism guide training program with 3 local guides from the Casa Clú beneficiary community.

Carry out the conditioning of a trail and infrastructure development for bird watching tours.

Develop together with local guides and Casa Clú staff the experience of at least one on-site tour along with your business and marketing plan.

  Provide Casa Clú and the guides with the necessary equipment and accompaniment so that they can carry out their program permanently, contributing to generating well-being for the young guides and their families as well as for Casa Clú.

Activities:

Carry out a workshop to develop the capacities of five nature tourism guides during 8 sessions of 5 hours each (40 hours) in the basic technical knowledge to carry out the activity of nature tourism guides and bird identification.

Implement the infrastructure to receive groups of visitors in the Casa Clú community garden to carry out bird watching activities on the site, favoring the presence of birds with native plants and fruit trees, drinkers and feeders for birds as well as benches for Let people sit and watch.

Co-design and plan at least two nature tourism activities in situ with the participation of the Casa Clú team.

Contribute to the implementation of the project through a promotion and marketing strategy.

  Provide initial equipment to the Casa Clú organization so that the guides have the necessary resources to carry out the tours.

Carry out monitoring of the program according to the work proposal co-designed with the apprentices of the program and the Casa Clú team,