Starter Kit. Idea 489 of 500. Cluster 27
Batticaloa lagoon tourism: the singing fish, the kayaks, the prawns, sold as a week
The mechanism, from the book
The land, the lagoons and the savings of families abroad are waiting. What comes first is the small business.
The first step
Hire 2 kayaks and a local fisherman for a weekend and run an evening paddle on the lagoon to listen for the singing fish, with a prawn supper afterwards. Price it per head and offer it to the guests of the nearest guesthouses. Note what they paid and whether they would stay longer for more days on the water. Guests asking for a full week show the idea holds.
- Who pays first
- A visitor to the east coast looking for something beyond the beach, who pays for an evening on the lagoon and a supper of its prawns.
- What leaves today
- Batticaloa's lagoon is known only as a story, and visitors pass through toward the beaches without spending a night on its water.
Ask first
- Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority. Ask how a lagoon tour and supper can be registered as a tourist service.
- Department of Wildlife Conservation. Ask whether paddling is allowed on the lagoon and where.
Check before you spend
Confirm permission to paddle on the lagoon, life jackets and a guide on every outing, insurance for guests, and safe food for the supper.
Find out these three numbers
- What would a guest pay for a paddle and prawn supper?
- How many guests are staying nearby on a normal night?
- What does the fisherman need to be paid for each evening?
A comparison from the book
Sigiriya. Chapter Five
"It is to give somebody a reason not to leave tomorrow."
One good evening on the lagoon is the start of a week there.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.