I work for the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Commission. Our busiest periods are March and April and October and November, when garbage collectors have far more work and the visitor centre receives many more people.
I am pleased that so many tourists come. Their presence shows how much people value this environment, and their spending supports conservation. But visitor numbers also increase the quantity of products consumed in lodges and teashops.
Tourists create demand for packaged goods, but local businesses are usually the ones disposing of the waste irresponsibly.
The problem is therefore indirect. Visitors themselves rarely throw rubbish into the wrong places. Teashop and lodge owners often do. Some local businesses seem to believe that keeping Khumbu clean is not their, but our responsibility, because we take care of the environment.
We try to explain that every business and resident shares responsibility. Environmental problems go beyond ordinary rubbish. We deal with everything left behind on high mountain and also with things like sanitation etcetera.
Tourists sometimes help educate local people. Many arrive with strong awareness of waste reduction and conservation and share what they know. Their behaviour can set a useful example.
A clean mountain region cannot be created by garbage collectors alone; every lodge, teashop, guide and visitor must take ownership.
Tourists also help finance our work. SPCC was originally established with WWF funding. Today, much of our support comes through the Nepal Tourism Board, which receives a two-percent tourism tax from almost every tourism business in the region.
This creates an important circle: tourism generates waste and pressure, but it also provides the funds needed for management. The system works only if businesses follow the rules rather than assuming paying taxes resolves them of all their responsibilities.
Visitors help pay for Khumbu’s cleanup, but lasting conservation will begin when the people creating and selling the waste stop seeing cleanliness as somebody else’s job.