Eco-Tourism as a strategy to leverage HIV/AIDs fight along the beaches

The World Conservation Unions (IUCN) Commission on National Parks and Protected Areas Eco-tourism is not just a developmental ecosystem protection tool but can also play a vital role in curbing socio-economic problems such as HIV/AIDS and Poverty. Eco-tourism is a major contributor to the world's economy, accounting for greater than 9 percent of global GDP and almost nine percent of jobs globally. In Kenya, the Government recognizes eco-tourism as having the potential of driving the economy especially for locally directed and participatory rural developments based on a rational utilization of the ecosystem, environmental and cultural resources on which ecotourism relies on for instance, fishing communities are considered to be more susceptible to HIV/AIDS on account of various risk factors associated with fishing and its related lifestyle. The study therefore adopts external and cultural theories respectively, The high prevalence rate of HIV/AIDS among the fishermen and fishmongers in the islands and beaches of Lake Victoria has been occasioned by poverty and diminishing fish catch as a result of over fishing and use of illegal fishing gears.