Archaeology and sustainable tourism in Egypt: Protecting community, antiquities, and environment

This paper explores how archaeologists should consider getting involved with sustainable tourism in order to communicate their findings to the public, protect the sites that they are working on, improve fund- raising for the archaeological project, and contribute to an economically viable system for the population of the area. Two examples illustrate the benefits of working closely with the local community. The Eastern Desert Antiquities Protection Project (EDAPP) involves a training program and the creation of a collection of present-day material culture by the Ababda nomads from the Eastern Desert in Egypt. The Fayum ecotourism project is a first step in defining the development needs for an area of Egypt that has an extremely interesting history but does not attract the mass tourism that the Giza pyramids and the monuments of Luxor do.