It is just over 10 years since Adama Bah invited me to The Gambia for the workshop he had organised at the Bungalow Beach Hotel to find a way forward for the informal sector in a period when the conflict between the taxi drivers and guides, the craft sellers and the juice pressers was boiling over. The conference in October 1999 resulted in the development of ASSET (the Association of Small Scale Enterprises in Tourism) and the DFID funded project which resulted in significant increases in living standards for many of the economically poor producers who are now part of ASSET, a trade association for small producers which has representation alongside the hoteliers and tour operators on the Responsible Tourism Partnership which works with the Gambian Tourism Authority and government to realise Responsible Tourism in The Gambia.

There are only four students here this year from the ICRT’s MSc in Responsible Tourism Management. They have the opportunity to share their learning with informal sector producers and those who have been part of ASSET since the beginning as well as hotel managers, policy makers and administrators form the Gambian Tourism Authority, the National Council for Arts and Culture, Equigambia and the Travel Foundation Gambia. For the first time this year we have three National Assembly Members participating in the course including the Chairman of the Select Committee on Tourism. We also had an impromptu contribution from a member of the British High Commission consular staff.

Fatou Beyai Raji, one of the ICRT’s alumni, is acting Director General of the Gambian Tourism Authority and she gave a presentation about the GTA’s work programme and her ambitions for the next five years.  The ICRT has been extensively and intensively engaged with The Gambia over the last three years and three of the people participating in the course have collected Responsible Tourism Awards at World Travel Market.