The Mountain Shepherds Initiative of the Nanda Devi Campaign has announced the long awaited list of finalists for the first ever Nanda Devi Women’s Trek 2006. Seventeen women from India, the US, Canada, and Taiwan were selected for their mountaineering skills and interest in mountain environments and peoples, and have been invited to come to the Nanda Devi region this September and October to take part in the initiative’s inaugural trek.

The Women’s Trek marks a major milestone in the community-based ecotourism efforts of the Nanda Devi Campaign. Five years in the making, the campaign hopes that this trek will launch a new type of tourism based on community aspirations in accordance with the social and environmental principles laid down in the groundbreaking Nanda Devi Declaration of 2001. For this, the campaign reached out to the world’s women mountaineers this past International Women’s Day to pay tribute to the mountain goddess as well as the region’s women who have played a central role in movements such as Chipko and more recent struggles over local forest, land, and water rights.

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