In 1973, the writer Peter Mattiessen, George Schaller and a small team of Sherpas trekked through parts of Dolpo. Over 40 years later, Schaller returned to Dolpo last year to retrace their route to Ringmo, Shey Gompa, Namgong, Saldang, Namdo.
The trip's purpose was to note cultural and environmental changes in Dolpo over the past decades, and most of what they found was negative even though Kathmandu declared the 3,555 sq km Shey-Phoksundo National Park in 1984 and later created a 1,349 sq km of buffer zone around its edges.
The team found that Shey-Phoksundo does not fit international criteria for a national park, given the extensive, permanent human activities throughout the park ranging from agriculture to livestock herding. It would be more accurate to call it a ‘conservation area’ like the Annapurna Conservation Area.
Park headquarters and staff are located in the far southern edge of the sanctuary, many days of trekking from the northern plateau. The six park rangers rotate every two years, and seldom leave headquarters, so there is little awareness of what is happening in most of the Park. A common complaint of residents is: “The Park does not listen.”
There are, in addition, 200 Nepal Army personnel posted in the Park who mostly remain at their base at Suligad even though their logical duty would be to monitor the yarsa harvest season in May and June when thousands of outsiders invade the Park, and poachers and robbers are active.
As the road network reaches Dunai, and more tourists, yarsa collectors and other outsiders come to Dolpo there has to be better regulation, improved garbage collection, and an effort to stop ugly construction.
A Lake Conservation Committee responsible for keeping the Phoksundo Lake clean was formed four years ago, but hasn’t done much. The Phoksundo Buffer Zone User Committee has no staff.
The Park collects entry fees from tourists and yarsa collectors, all timber licenses have a price tag. Up to half the fees are supposed to be spent for maintaining trails and bridges, but they are not even repaired near the Park headquarters.
