Documenting Tourist Attraction Sites and Development of a National Photoban…

Innovation methods

Data sources

SDG(s)

Sustainable Development Goal(s)

1No poverty

8Decent work and economic growth

9Industry, innovation and infrastructure

Disclaimer:

Please be aware that the content herein has not been peer reviewed. It consists of personal reflections, insights, and learnings of the contributor(s). It may not be exhaustive, nor does it aim to be authoritative knowledge.

Title

Please provide a name for your action learning plan.

Documenting Tourist Attraction Sites and Development of a National Photobank

Challenge statement

Challenge type: If you are working on multiple challenges, please indicate if this is your "big bet" or "exploratory" challenge. Please note: we ask you to only submit a maximum of 3 challenges - 1x Big Bet, 2x Exploratory. Each challenge must be submitted individually.

EXPLORATORY

Challenge statement: What is your challenge? (Please answer in specific terms: "Our challenge is that...”.)

Our challenge is that many heritage sites and other tourist attraction sites have not been documented and marketed to promote both domestic and international tourism as well to attract investment for sustainable tourism

Background: What is the history of your challenge? What is causing or driving it? Who is involved? How does the current situation look like? What undesired effects does it produce?

The Lesotho's tourism impediments include infrastructure inadequacy, low levels of tourism collaborations and investment. It is also notable that the sector lacks proper legal framework and natural resources governance including heritage sites as well as protected areas.

Quantitative evidence: What (official) data sources do you have on this challenge that better exemplifies the importance and urgency of this frontier challenge? You can add text, a link, or a picture.

Qualitative evidence: What weak signals have you recently spotted that characterizes its urgency? Please provide qualitative information that better exemplifies the importance and urgency of this frontier challenge. You can add text, a link, or a picture.

Development and importance of tourism for Lesotho (worlddata.info)

Value proposition: What added value or unique value proposition is your Accelerator Lab bringing to solving this challenge? Why is it your Lab that needs to work on this challenge and not other actors within UNDP, other stakeholders in the country respectively? Why is it worth investing resources to this challenge?

The AccLab wishes to document tourist attraction sites with specific focus to those that have not been explored. Documenting these sites will open new avenues of economic activities and further work as a platform for building new tourism products and services in these areas. This documentation will also assist in the promotion of domestic travel and assist the Lesotho’s tourism sector recover from the adverse effect of COVID-19. With the awareness of scenic views that exist within communities, it is believed that tourism will be seen as an income generating sector. Communities will appreciate the attraction sites in their neighborhoods as they receive more visitors due to the exposure they receive.

Short “tweet” summary: We would like to tweet what you are working on, can you summarize your challenge in a maximum of 280 characters?

The AccLab in Lesotho in partnership with the Lesotho Development Corporation develops a National Photobank to support sustainable tourism through documentation of attraction sites

Challenge classification

Partners

Who are your top 5 partners for this challenge? Please submit from MOST to LEAST important and state Name, Sector and a brief description of the (intended) collaboration.

Please state the name of the Parter:

Lesotho Tourism Development Corporation: Coordination of the photo collection and management of the photobank

What sector does our partner belong to?

Government (&related)

Please provide a brief description of the collaboration.

This collaboration is focused on collecting places of Lesotho’s beauty and unexplored tourist attraction sites for documenting, boost visitation to the existing tourist attraction sites and finally create information hub for tourism products and services and to attract investment

Is this a new and unusual partner for UNDP?

Yes

Learning questions

Learning question: What is your learning question for this challenge? What do you need to know or understand to work on your challenge statement?

The hypothesis is that, documenting these sites will open new avenues of economic activities and further work as a platform for building new tourism products and services in these areas. This documentation will also assist in the promotion of domestic travel and assist the Lesotho’s tourism sector recover from the adverse effect of COVID-19.

To what stage(s) in the learning cycle does your learning question relate?

Explore, Test

Usage of methods: Relating to your choice above, how will you use your methods & tools for this learning question? What value do these add in answering your learning question?

The Lab will use hackathons to appraise best documentation of the sites as well as work with the communities to identify hidden

Existing data gaps: Relating to your choice above, what existing gaps in data or information do these new sources of data addressing? What value do these add in answering your learning question?

There has not been any baseline study on domestic tourism. There is also still limited research that assesses domestic tourists’ profiles, travel patterns, motivations, tourism products and services in Lesotho.

Closing

Early leads to grow: Think about the possible grow phase for this challenge - who might benefit from your work on this challenge or who might be the champions in your country that you should inform or collaborate with early on to help you grow this challenge?

The communities as well as private sector players in tourism sector