The project was developed based on expertise obtained through the time dedicated to working in rural communities, allowing the identification of factors that make up dysfunctional situations that deserve to be solved. The aim is to promote sustainable tourism development by strengthening the value chain supported by the professionalization of human talent, making the most of its natural and cultural resources in full accordance with the latest investments from the public and private sectors.
The proposal contemplates several scenarios: the social problem; the execution of entrepreneurship workshops, and the expected results with long-term positive impact and high levels of social profitability.
Introduction
The commune La Entrada, located 72 km north of the cantonal head of Santa Elena, has according to data from the communal council, with around 700 inhabitants, they are engaged in both agriculture, artisanal fishing, and trade. its basic services are drinking water, electricity, telecommunications, a school, a medical dispensary, the presence of two lines of transport buses, but it lacks sanitary and river sewers, and there is no police station, it enjoys a warm climate, with temperatures ranging from 16 ° C. in summer up to 30 ° C. in winter.
At the end of the 2000s, the Ministry of Tourism of Ecuador began studies for the design, equipment, and operation of several ecotourism trails in the province of Santa Elena with its respective interpretation center. The parameters that were considered for said studies allowed the entrance to the commune to be considered through a path that is used by its inhabitants for agricultural work. Once the studies were completed, the Ministry began with the tasks of equipping various trails for their subsequent inauguration, with several lagging behind due to lack of funding, including La Entrada.
In this sense, the Provincial Government of Santa Elena, receives and attends the request of the community and begins with the tasks corresponding to the equipment of the ecotourism path of the commune La Entrada, the same that is made available to visitors at the end of the month October this year, with its respective mini-interpretation center, making a long-awaited dream come true for the inhabitants of that town.
Analysis and description of the problem.- Despite the actions taken by the public sector, there are several factors that influence the correct development of the tourist activity, generating a series of situations that limit the improvement of the quality of life of its inhabitants, but all revolve around variables linked to the culture and idiosyncrasy of the inhabitants. Several of them will be analyzed below:
The low level of preparation of the inhabitants is subject to the few alternatives of education at the secondary level, although with the existing ones it contributes somewhat to the strengthening of the value chain in the customer service sector, there is little that these centers of Studies contribute to the development of the entrepreneurial spirit of the inhabitants, either due to the lack of careers or the absence of subjects that promote the development of entrepreneurial skills in young people.
A determining factor in the origin and cause of the problem is the idiosyncrasy of the inhabitants, that is, the mentality and custom of the people, the conformist spirit that limits the breadth of the visionary horizon of a human being, and forces him to feel satisfied and satisfied. even with the minimum conditions, creating an environment of rejection of any development or improvement proposal that comes from abroad, considering it outside of their personal aspirations.
The work carried out by the institutions in charge of providing technical assistance to the communities in the North zone has been limited and in the case of La Entrada it is not very significant. Workshops, training seminars, talks, exhibitions, among other activities, always contribute to strengthening the mentality of the residents of the community. But as a result of all these determining factors, a series of dysfunctional situations are generated that must be carefully analyzed:
When the opportunities for academic preparation do not exist and the scenario for development is reduced, the contribution that the generation of new business alternatives produces in the social reality of a community also decreases. In the La Entrada community, this lack limits the opportunities for participation. In the generation of productive activities for the benefit of their development, added to this, the quality of the local workforce decreases, which reduces the possibilities of capturing the few jobs that are generated in the population.
Thus, various negative consequences are generated, such as conformity with reality and the negative attitude of participating in the opportunities for improvement that are presented to benefit the community. The idiosyncrasy or negative attitude in the participation of workshops and seminars that are presented reduces the opportunities for improvement and affects the levels of quality of life of the inhabitants and makes the environment difficult in the face of any program or plan that is generated aimed at improving the social and economic reality of the community.
The scarce opportunities of preparation for the community by the institutions called to produce them and bring them to it make the process of transformation and development that the commune deserves to be slow, the positive results and the expected impact on the social and economic reality. of the locality are seen in the very long term, that the opportunities for improvement in the formation of the community members and the negative idiosyncrasy of them have to wait much longer for an opportunity to change them.
Given all this, the following problematic question could well be asked: To what extent does the lack of an adequate process of training and integral formation in the inhabitants of the commune La Entrada contribute to the generation of a social and economic reality with low levels of quality of life in the population?
Justification
The central government has been developing a series of programs aimed at strengthening the country's productive sector, state institutions that run training workshops through organizations such as the National Finance Corporation, the National Development Bank, among others, which in partnership both with the provincial governments, as with the cantonal ones, they try to improve the quality of life of the people as well as the productivity and profitability of the micro and small companies.
At the Santa Elena province level, these programs have been gradually developed, executed by different institutions that independently or jointly seek to achieve noble objectives. In the commune of La Entrada, given the reality exposed and analyzed in the area, it is convenient to look for alternatives aimed at promoting the development of new sources of work, generating jobs, and capable of reactivating the local economy, dynamizing the tourism value chain with high community participation, and which in turn generate a positive long-term impact with high social returns.
Overall objective
Contribute to the socio-economic development of the inhabitants of the La Entrada community through the design and execution of training workshops on tourism entrepreneurship to increase productive alternatives, strengthening the local tourist offer with high standards of competitive quality.
Technical analysis
This program is in harmony with the strategic bases of sustainable tourism in Ecuador included in PLANDETUR 2020. This project meets these requirements in two of its axes:
Axis 2: Development and strengthening of community tourism; in numeral 2.6.7. Professionalization of managers and technical staff for community tourism.
Axis 4: Education and training in sustainable tourism; Capacity development of human resources for sustainable tourism in section 4.1.2. Quality in higher education in tourism and 4.1.3. Citizen awareness in sustainable tourism; and in section 4.2.1. Development of technical training plans for tourism service providers.
In the project 2.6.7. Professionalization of managers and technical personnel for community tourism is expressed as having potential to contribute to the achievement of the MDGs. In the project 4.2.1. Development of technical training plans for tourism service providers, it is stated that it will coordinate between MINTUR and the Higher Education Centers to permanently train tourism activity providers.
Likewise, the proposal is aligned in PLANDETUR 2020 in the program of Innovation of Tourist Products and Education and Training in Sustainable Tourism in the following objectives:
Strengthen the technical capacities of tourism management and operation geared towards community tourism.
Professionalize and technify the tourist service according to the consumption requirements of the national and international market.
Improve the competitiveness and sustainability of community tourism through the consolidation of human resource capacities at the technical, operational and management levels.
Contribute to the revitalization of tourism by promoting tourism micro-enterprises in favorable conditions as an opportunity for the generation of employment and inclusive productive self-employment, especially for the participation of women and youth.
Benefited population
The population benefited from the proposed training in tourist entrepreneurship workshops will be the inhabitants of the La Entrada commune, who may or may not have businesses with tourism activities, men and women with business initiatives, in a maximum number of workshops for 30 participants, recommending that There will be a new workshop if the number of participants exceeds the recommended, to achieve meaningful learning.
Academic structure of the proposal
The theme selected for this training program in Tourism Entrepreneurship is made up of modules of 9 hours each, under the following scheme:
General methodological recommendations
Basically the same methods, teaching modalities and learning techniques used in any academic field will be taken into account. However, the methodological proposal revolves around generating active learning, based on the fact that teaching techniques and modalities will be applied and combined according to the fact that the participants are not children or young schoolchildren, but adults and older adults, according to the case, that they have hardly finished the cycle of primary education.
For this reason, it is recommended to work with environmental materials, using as few projectors as possible, to work in workshops that promote the construction of knowledge based on the reality of the environment of the participants. Thus, the following methodological scheme is suggested:
Teaching methods
• Case study • Problem
solving and exercise
• Problem-based
learning
• Cooperative learning • Learning contract
Organizational modalities
• Seminars and workshops
• Practical classes
• External practices
• Study and group work
Learning techniques
• Guided discussion
• Workshop
• Seminar
• Field practice
• Brainstorming
• Forum
• Dramatization
Evaluation criteria
• Works and projects
• Reports-practical memories
• Tests of execution of real and / or simulated tasks
• Self-evaluation system
• Scale of attitudes
Schedule of execution of the training program
The work that will be carried out in the training sessions in tourism entrepreneurship workshops will last a total of 90 hours, with 5 modules of 18 hours that will be taught in two weeks each. Based on this, the present training schedule has been established, which includes the following topics:
At the end of this training proposal for the commune La Entrada it is possible to reach the following conclusions:
There is little attention from the organizations and institutions called to guarantee the practice of inclusive and sustainable tourism towards the La Entrada community.
The social and economic development of the community is conditioned to the culture and idiosyncrasy of the people rooted in the collective consciousness of the inhabitants of the locality.
It is possible to strengthen the commercial sector of the community by providing growth opportunities through innovation in their businesses.
The role of the Santa Elena Peninsula State University is preponderant when taking the initiative and providing assistance to the case in training issues.
It is also important to highlight the participation of the students of the race in tourism development projects that allow them to reach new perspectives of the tourist reality of the environment.
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