Daily Times

Our collective proclivity to quote jargons of all sorts, without truly grasping their attendant permutations, is limitless. From search for a counter militancy discourse to technology incubation and benefiting from youth bulge — there is always a sense of urgency for hurried adoption of alien notions without first having recourse to some soul searching. Lost invariably in the process is the precious, home-grown wisdom to do things and handle challenges in a way that is efficient and in complete sync with our local norms.

No better example of this phenomenon can be found than in the case of eco-tourism in Pakistan. After having spoilt many places of pristine natural charms — Murree, Naran, Kalam, Abbotabad, GB, and Karachi beaches — one can hear the mantra of eco-tourism as the sole remedy for reviving these erstwhile natural heavens to their original splendour. But do we really need to look outward and to lay hands on purportedly alien solutions of eco-tourism to fix the malaise that would not have happened if local wisdom would have been valued in the first place?

Anybody, having good fortune of visiting once-scenic valleys of Kaghan, Swat and Kashmir must have come across caravans of nomadic people — Gujjars of high hills. With their stock of hundreds of bleating sheep and goats, these shaggily clothed, sturdy men and women can be seen toiling up treacherous and unending mountainous roads, travelling to high altitude alpine pastures during summer months. More than a cursory look and first-hand interaction would be needed to really understand the way, these semi-nomadic tribes — always on the move — practice and live through principles of eco-tourism all their lives.

Movements of these Gujjar herders coincide with dictates of nature; onset of early summers and profusion of succulent greenery in high altitude meadows trigger their upward movement to take their livestock to new grazing grounds. During the course of this typically hundred miles long yatra, these nomads would happily take as food what Mother Nature has to offer. This food includes local varieties of green herbs and spinaches; indigenous fruits and berries; wild shrubs of high nutritious value; fresh milk and yielding cakes of self-brewed cheese; eggs from indigenous varieties of poultry; and a wealth of high hill spices of all description — cardamom, coriander, rosemary, clove, and saffron. All these precious endowments are securely tucked inside tattered and outwardly unkempt cloth bags, mounted atop accompanying mules and donkeys, to be carefully consumed at leisure and pleasure.

These sturdy children of hills, who happily travel hundreds of miles over treacherous paths ascending tens of thousands of feet, eat nothing but from the hands of Mother Nature and sip nothing but from the sparkling, singing, and gushing water springs. Steel-nerved women among them give birth to children during the course of these unending and upward toiling, pausing only for a few hours to allow nature to complete its act — and thanks to treasures of magical, medicinal products from high hills — are up on their feet immediately, with blessed newly arrived guests securely tied around their waists.

In the presence of these blissful practitioners of eco-tourism toiling high valleys of northern Pakistan, do we really need foreign consultants to teach us how to promote eco-tourism without spoiling our natural endowments?

Turning now to ugly and ominous concrete jungles resulting from mushrooming of eye-sore hotels and buildings that now completely dominate once adorable hill stations alike Murree and Galiat. All of these could have been avoided, if only we had learnt basics of eco-tourism from our high hill, semi-nomadic Gujjar friends. On a visit to high hill alpine meadows in upper Kaghan, Swat, Kashmir, or GB valleys — one can easily see the principles of nature-friendly, high hill livelihood in actual practice. These nomadic people, after completing their tiring journeys, occupy one of countless alpine pastures — typically located above ten thousand feet altitude — for spending summer months, fattening and rearing their livestock. Grass-thatched huts and simple rooms constructed from drift and fallen wooden logs without a single brick or iota of mortar monstrosity can be seen dotted undulating landscape of these alpine pastures. Living in and living by the nature without sullying in any way the face of these virgin, high valleys is the cardinal and unwritten code of conduct that has been religiously adhered to by countless generations of these high hill grazing communities.

What made entrepreneurs and hoteliers including the state functionaries, responsible for overseeing “development” in hilly towns and hill stations, completely ignore the “eco-tourism” practices of nomadic herders and Gujjars — their millennia-old unwritten code of conduct entailing respectful submission to Mother Nature? You see the totally transient, temporary, and un-intrusive livelihood practices, in vogue in high hill alpine meadows and you are reminded of a devout pujaree, performing solemn rites of respectful subjugation before goddesses of nature in glaciated enclaves of Saif-ul-Malook, Sharda and Deosai. And then you turn your eyes to avarice-filled, marauding antics of (in) famous land developers, aka land grabbers, who with their bulldozers are denuding hill terraces and jungle-covered slopes to construct more and yet more of concretized and ugly structures in and around our once pristine hill stations.

No genius is needed to name and shame the real culprits who are defying and defiling precious face of nature’s bounties across many of our hilly heavens, in the name of land development and tourism promotion. Our simple and sturdy hilly nomads have some precious and elementary lessons to teach our tourism departments, corporations and criminally silent governments on how to live and enjoy nature with respectful deference up in the green and mountainous valleys. In their centuries-old uphill and downhill sojourns; in their reverential sipping from gushing water springs; in their partaking of natural dietary delicacies from virgin jungles; and in the treasure troves atop disciplined columns of their pack animals, there are lessons for all of us on harmonious co-existence with nature — the essence of.

The writer is an environment and public policy expert