Prospects of ecotourism development in Perak’s Orang Asli settlements: A SWOT(C) analysis of the Lanoh case

The development of vulnerable groups such as the aboriginal communities is currently high on the Malaysian government’s post-election agenda. In this connection an empirical study was conducted to examine the development pospects of local tourism for the Lanoh community of the Perak’s Lenggong valley, a world heritage site. Through a SWOT(C) analysis the study identifies the strength, weakness, opportunity and threat or challenging aspects facing the Lanoh with respect to tourism development. The community was found to possess internal strengths to change with time as exemplified by their (i) acceptance of the sedentary settlement concept ( PSK) which signified their willingness to reside in zinck and brick as opposed to the rumbia and bamboo/ rattan houses , and (ii) ) acceptance of electronic technologies such as the TV and mobile telephones which signified their openness to external information. The weaknesses had a lot to do with the Lanoh physical isolation and remoteness which rendered them unable to harness their common interest with other aboriginal communities to form, forexample, a cooperative venture. The study found plenty of development opportunies for the Lanoh in the form of several, already existing, policy and strategic plan instruments along with human capital development programmes geared for the socio-economic advancement of the Lanoh. Finally, the Lanoh had to grapple with threats and challenges in the form of (i) shortages of local human resource following the out-migration of Lanoh members in search of jobs elsewhere; (ii) impediment to local tourism development as a direct consequence of Act 134 which prohibits outsiders from being present in the aboriginal Rezerves; (iii) school dropouts of the Lanoh youths; and (iv)environmental issues resulting from soil erosion and flow disturbance of the Soh river as direct impacts of illegal logging of their forest reserves.