Ecuador wants visitors to discover for themselves the meaning behind the country’s new tourism slogan: Love Life.
“Our people prioritize how they want to live their lives even before they think about how they will earn money. That’s the power of the people,” says Carlos Guzman Neira, a sub-secretary in the Ministry of Tourism.
In 2008, Ecuador’s new constitution was the first in the world to recognise legally enforceable Rights of Nature, or ecosystem rights.
Speaking at ITB Asia, Neira said this meant that Ecuadorians by law could not exploit natural resources without considering the middle and long-term consequences of their actions.”
There was much to protect in the way of biodiversity, he said. “Eighty percent of all species found in the Amazon region were found in the three percent of the Amazon within Ecuador.”
The country also includes the Galápagos Islands in the Pacific, about 1,000 kilometres west of the mainland.
“The world knows about the Galapagos Islands but not so much about Ecuador,” Neira said. “We want to change that.”
With 19 airports spread around the country and new roads being built through the Andes, accessibility within Ecuador and to neighbours Colombia and Peru is considered to be adequate.
The train ride connecting Guayaquil and capital city Quito – declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in the 1970s for having the best preserved and least altered historic centre in Latin America –is being restored and hopes to be fully operational in 2012.
See our video interview with Carlos Guzman at
http://www.travelmole.tv/watch_multiplevdos.php?sid=&id=15654
