Community partnership for ecotourism based on an environmental education program for sustainable development in sierra De Huautla, Mexico

The need for effective environmental education programs in the Latin American region has been made evident by deteriorating environmental conditions. The potential of ecotourism to contribute to environmental education programs with the community’s partnership has increasingly been acknowledged in the recent years. This article illustrates the partners hip between the community of Sierra de Huautla in south-central Mé xico and Morelos State University and the community in utilizing the ecotourism opportunity as a means for achieving environmental education objectives. The partners hip between an academic institution and the local community has yielded the development of an environmental education curriculum as well as teaching materials based on local knowledge that are now being in corporated into formal education curricula. This article recommends that a frame work and in dicators be developed to evaluate the outcomes so that the curri culum can be tested, revised and replicated in other communities of the region.