BRDC to hold SMiLE initiative in other districts to woo tourists

Tour operators joining Mangalam Kali at Banam Farm House, a SMiLE venture at Kasargod

Having convinced about the immense, unique and varying tourism potential of the pristine north Malabar in Kerala, the state run Bekal Resorts Development Corporation (BRDC) has come out with a seemingly viable and pragmatic strategy to ensure quantum jump in tourist inflow to the region.

The Small and Medium Industries Leveraging Experiential tourism (SMiLE) initiative of BRDC, where small entrepreneurs are trained to leverage experiential tourism and budget accommodation, is a model that can be replicated in other districts of the state, said industry players. Number of districts which have potential for tourism, but underdeveloped in the state, is more than that of developed destinations and hence replicating the model to other districts would give giant strides in tourism activities of the whole state. In a short span of two years, BRDC has created 50 small and medium ‘experiential tourism enterprises’ and budget accommodation for 400 tourists under the initiative in North Malabar.

Malabar Kalari

The BRDC, joining hands with the Association of Tourism Trade Organisations India (ATTOI), has organized a three-day long interesting programme – ‘SMiLE Ambassadors Tour’, in the first week of December, by facilitating meaningful ‘Business to Business’ interactive session involving the SMiLE tourism entrepreneurs and the nation’s leading tour operators including those from Delhi, Goa and Mumbai.

Having realized sweeping changes in the conventional tourism arena and that the region lags far behind in ensuring linkage between leading tour operators and the aspiring SMiLE entrepreneurs, the programme has conceived a meaningful and well knit package by taking the tour operators to potential and emerging tourism destinations including upcoming farm, cultural centres and villages with natural bounty in abundance especially those dotted in the picturesque hilly hamlets, besides the famed Bekal Fort, facing Arabian Sea.

“The basic objective of the programme is to establish close linkage between tour operators and SMiLE entrepreneurs hailing from north of Vatakara taluk in Kozhikode besides familiarizing them with the hitherto unexplored destinations,” said BRDC Managing Director T K Manzoor.

Tour operators experiencing the taste of homemade delicacies at a SMiLE farmstay

“The novel and innovative programme is mainly intended to develop a viable strategy to eventually enhance inflow of both foreign and domestic tourists to the north Malabar region and thus bolster confidence among the aspiring SMiLE ventures. The initiative is certain to enhance the stake of tourism sector in the nation’s Gross Domestic Product,” Manzoor added.

While the region mainly focused on leisure and premium tourism by giving added thrust to set up star hotel facilities in the earlier days, the BRDC has realized that it’s time to shift the focus to experiential tourism and to accommodate aspirations of mid and low budget foreign tourists segments, in particular, who mainly look forward to experience the minute cultural and linguistic heterogeneity of the region, aptly known as ‘Sapthabhasha Sangamabhoomi’ (confluence of seven languages). The tourists are also eagerly looking to taste the home made unique and diverse mouth-watering delicacies at affordable rates.

Manzoor further said that the BRDC has recently released the story-telling mobile app -SMiLE VTG- that could be downloaded from google play store and the facility would provide illustrations about various tourism attractions and details of SMiLE ventures to contact.

Stating that north Malabar region is all set to be future global tourism destination, Association of Tourism Trade Organisations India (ATTOI) Kerala State unit President C S Vinod underscored the need to set up eco-friendly tourism infrastructure across the State so that the mistakes and miscalculations made in the past are not repeated. “In the light of recent flood havoc, the entrepreneurs should emphasis on setting up quality tourism rather than harping on massive structures by giving little heed to the forces of nature,” Vinod said in an interactive session held at the North Malabar Chamber of Commerce hall in Kannur (NMCC).

Tour operators enjoying puppetry show held at Bekal cultural centre

The speakers at the interactive session stressed on the need to impart continuous and specialized training to those running home stays, resorts and farm houses dotted in village and other remote hamlets.

The BRDC, notwithstanding the hectic preparations to give finishing touches to Kannur International Airport a day before its formal dedication to the nation on December 9, visited the airport facilities and held talks with authorities to get feedback from them on the potential foreign and domestic inflow and solicited tips to further promote tourism infrastructure networks for hassle-free movement of air-borne tourists to the region.

“The BRDC’s innovative programme is certain to brighten the prospects of tourist inflow to pristine areas of the north Malabar region in quick span of time and is all set to emerge as leading tourism destination in the globe,” said P K Anish Kumar, CEO of the Thiruvananthapuram-based Travel Planners.