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Published on November 10, 2007

United Nations tourism experts plan to transform a stop on the backpacker trail through Indochina into a major destination. But getting to Kratie remains a bit of an ordeal, while the UN officials have identified a "psychological gap" between residents and tourists as another drawback.

Not much moves in Kratie besides the Mekong. It's a town offering unbelievable sunsets - and no good reason to remain awake afterwards.

Instead of lorries there are pony-drawn carts. Spacious rooms in French colonial mansions go for US$5 (B170) a night, and there's not a single building taller than the trees that line the riverside boulevard. A perfect breather: a town that seems to be immersed in a deep, meditative state - one that draws you in within minutes of stepping off the bus.

Even the handful of food sellers along the river are lethargic, flopping over stalls like they're there of habit, or taking up space until droves from Phnom Penh return for the Khmer New Year festival, when they will picnic on the hundreds of islets exposed just north of the town when the Mekong drains to a sprawling collection of bubbly streams.

But, this may change. Kratie has been selected as the starting point of what will become the Mekong River Discovery Trail, a 200-kilometre eco-tourism strip along the river all the way to Laos. The trail is part of Cambodia's drive to diversify its lucrative tourism industry from almost exclusive reliance on Siem Reap - the town adjacent to Angkor's temple complexes.

There, hotel rooms go for hundreds of dollars a night while some of the world's most expensive spas offer spiritually traumatised tourists one-on-one healing sessions with "life coaches" flown in from the States.

From July to September experts from the United Nations World Tourism Organisation scoured Kratie and its adjacent countryside, planning urban renewal projects as well as a list of attractions to hype.

"Kratie should position itself in the regional tourism market as the 'tourism gateway and service centre for northeast Cambodia' - providing high-quality (value-for-money) accommodations and services along the route between Laos, northeast Cambodia, Vietnam and Phnom Penh," they concluded.

This goal seems a bit farfetched, especially to anyone who has endured the bus ride from Phnom Penh. Kratie remains beyond the reach of most leisure travellers: not just because it is remote, but because getting there is hell.

In Cambodia, when they say roads are good, that just means they're paved. The circuitous route from Phnom Penh to Kratie - which takes an hour and 20 minutes longer than the guidebooks promise - requires dodging impervious cattle, motorcycles laden with extended families and more than a few close calls with children on bikes. Even worse, bus drivers are captivated by the sound of their own horns, and there's no escape from the blaring television up front. It blasts a combination of music videos, variety shows and ecstatic commercials for cards for cash machines that, like escalators, are a recent arrival in this most charming land.

But, after the stressful journey, Kratie soothes. The town is situated on a luxurious and expansive curve of the Mekong. The view is so dramatic you almost have to close your eyes in homage, especially during the monsoon season when riots of light and ink-coloured clouds swoop down from the opposite bank.

Guesthouses like Heng Heng (Lucky Lucky) Hotel line the river, providing second and third-floor terraces with awnings to keep off the rain.

Up until now Kratie's foreign visitors have been backpackers travelling to and from Laos: the town is a pit stop on their trail through Indochina, a trail gradually being transformed into a highway. There is a handful of western residents: eccentric restaurant and guesthouse owners and earnest staff of non-governmental organisations.

With only a trickle of westerners passing through, Cambodians making a living catering to them are few in number and you almost never run into one with hospitality training. Consequently conversations, albeit brief, remain genuine and laden with surprise, though the language barrier can be intense. Kratie remains one of those increasingly rare destinations where its people are as intrigued by you as you are by them.

The UN experts, however, arrived at a different conclusion. The lack of English in Kratie creates a "psychological gap" between local residents and tourists that leaves the latter "not feeling at home", their report warns. Hotel workers sometimes stare at western guests "as if they have seen a new species", they say.

Even the bus from Phnom Penh  shocked these world travellers. "There is no exchange of information between tourist and bus crew during the entire seven-hour journey. It stops at Cambodian restaurants where tourists are shocked at the sight of and the way local delicacies (spiders, crickets, etc) are sold," the report observes.

The document is the culmination of the first phase of an $800,000 project jointly funded by the UN, the Dutch development agency SNV and the Cambodian government.

In 10 years, the report projects - perhaps naively - more than a quarter of a million foreign tourists will visit Kratie annually. An additional 640 hotel rooms will be needed to accommodate them, and 1,200 jobs will be created. Local farmers and fisher folk will require hospitality training: they'll need to be taught that the customer is always right.

Jay Blakeney, the UN consultant in charge of the Mekong project, admits most in the area aren't interested in tourism, and few have even heard of eco-tourism. Surveys found they want better hygiene, education for their children and roads, he says. But Cambodia's government has an abysmal record of addressing - or even acknowledging - the most basic needs of its people, and there are few signs that this will change. Still, optimistic officials say, it is possible to develop infrastructure for tourists - improved waste management and utilities, for example - in ways that will benefit Cambodians. And the UN consultants included one whose expertise was developing "pro-poor tourism". (Her daily fee was more than 10 times the monthly income of most Cambodians.)

The northeast is the country's poorest region in terms of cash. Most people there live on less than half a dollar a day, officials say. (These are crop- and fish-based economies so measuring income in terms of cash can be misleading.)

However, the fishing villages along the upper Mekong have seen catches plunge since river guards were employed last year to protect the 100 or so Mekong dolphins still hanging on in nine deep pools between Kratie and Laos.

Zoning restrictions and bans on certain types of fishing that endanger the dolphins - the use of gill nets, dynamite and electric shock - mean the villagers are restricted to catching small fish.

The dolphins will be the main attraction of the discovery trail, but their survival is far from assured. (The project was originally named the Mekong River Dolphin Discovery Trail but the word "dolphin" was dropped from the title in case they became extinct, one official confided. This was denied by another official, who said the idea was to promote the river as a whole rather than focus solely on the dolphins.)

Conservationists and tourism officials agree finding alternative income for the fishing villages is key to protecting the dolphins. The problem is that there are few alternatives, and the fishermen are becoming desperate.

Three were jailed after being caught electrocuting fish.

Villagers say with just small nets and traps they can catch enough to feed themselves but not enough to sell.

Some, like Lee Srimon in Kampi village, have switched from fishing to carving wooden dolphins and other trinkets to sell to tourists, but this supports few.

For Blakeney, the way to get local residents involved is to offer them the right to manage resources and charge fees, so outsiders are prevented from taking control.

Ensuring this happens will require more than a plan.

Vincent MacIssac

Special to The Nation