How TAO Philippines empowers local communities through sustainable tourism

Each expedition is not only meant to show you nature’s beauty in its pure, unadulterated form but also a way to immerse in local communities and their culture. “It’s all about the islands, the culture and the people. It’s about experiencing the rawness of the islands that they cannot experience in touristy places,” says Edi, one of the founders of TAO Philippines, summarising their typical expedition. It is finding happiness in the mundane.

On the boat, you meet the other travellers joining the trip. Like you, they are game to get lost in an idyll and make their travel fantasies come true. You instantly connect with people you barely know, some from different parts of the world and others are locals who have lived in the islands all their lives. As the boat docks on one of TAO base camps, you either explore the island, lounge by the tuka bamboo huts or have drinks on a secluded beach. “Our bamboo huts are shaped like a tuka [beak] of a bird, an important symbol of TAO. [They are] sustainable, typhoon-proof and an innovative design for the raw experience awaiting,” he explains. Depending on the season, you might even be lucky to get the chance to harvest crabs from the mangroves or fetch fresh water from the spring or well and get immersed in the local community.

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Assigned to make the base camps a cosy home are the ladies of TAO Women’s Association. From massages to housekeeping and guest relations to product development (like VCO and VCO-based items like soaps), these women give the warmth you need while away from home. As the sun sets, everyone retires to their respective cocoons to recharge for another exhilarating journey the next day.

You are then brought to the TAO Farm, which will be your next base camp. It is where the team plants and harvests the produce for their dishes, which are prepared and cooked at the community food production centres they established. The result is a carefully crafted seven-course menu using the freshest ingredients harvested from their backyard, eliminating dependence on supplies from the mainland. Of course, you get to indulge in these culinary creations during the expedition.

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Still not over from the previous days’ dreamy sojourn, you now ride TAO’s iconic Balatik, a 74-foot-long traditional paraw (sailboat) and sail down the majestic limestones around the spellbinding Bacuit Bay in El Nido. The Balatik, designed by Gener Paduga who also designed the tuka bamboo, is crafted out of different kinds of wood and has two outriggers and no deep keel. It was patterned after the traditional boats that navigated shallow reefs between Philippine islands over a thousand years ago. It was blessed by a tribal leader before its maiden voyage.

Onboard the paraw, you feel like being transported back in time, navigating the beauty of nature that surrounds you while enjoying downtime with your new-found friends. In between, you go swimming and snorkelling while the expedition masters catch fish for your lunch onboard. The paraw glides onto the calm sea and when the weather becomes unruly, the cheeky TAO Lost Boys are there to look after you. They all underwent tedious rescue training to ensure everyone’s safety. “The training was not easy. They were asked to swim three kilometres and, at some point, tried drowning and saving themselves along the way. We also have a detailed evacuation plan, and we are well-equipped. We take safety seriously,” Edi proudly says. Mostly sons of ex-pirates and fishermen, the TAO Lost Boys know the islands like the back of their hand and working for TAO Philippines is like redemption and renewal for them.

When it is time to say goodbye, separation anxiety inevitably kicks in. But then you realised you gained new friends and of course, a lot of life-changing experiences.

But when did this kind of Robinson Crusoe-like aimless expedition start? A brainchild of Edi and his co-founder Jack, TAO Philippines was born out of their love for Palawan. Edi, who was a native of the Mountain Province up north, just came back from studying and working abroad and had started exploring the islands of Palawan in early 2000s. Soon after, his friend Jack, a British architecture student then, came to the Philippines. “We liked exploring the islands, and we kind of didn’t want to go back,” says Edi, expressing his love for the place. And who wouldn’t? El Nido and Coron have the highest concentration of the most beautiful islands in the archipelago, so much so that it has earned worldwide recognition. Years later, what began as leisure eventually became a business model that would later become a benchmark for sustainable, community-based tourism in the area.

They started bringing guests from tourist towns to remote islands, and people slowly learnt of their presence through word of mouth. With the help of the families they knew in the area—some were islanders whose homes became their homestays, others were boatmen and their children—Edi and Jack established TAO Philippines, its name derived from tao, the Filipino word for people, referring to everyone who is at the centre of everything they do.

What TAO Philippines does is far from the ordinary. Besides access to some of the most idyllic spots in El Nido and Coron and an immersive experience like no other, TAO Philippines gives back to the communities they work with by providing a livelihood to the islanders. “We structured it like we keep training young men from the islands because they are eager [to learn]. Some of them we trained on the ground; others we even sent to the universities in Puerto Princesa. A lot of them are still with us up to now,” he narrates. The group also builds early-learning schools in remote villages through the TAO Kalahi Foundation (kalahi, meaning “of the same breed” in Filipino), an initiative that they solely funded.  Made of expertly crafted bent bamboo and nylon,  the schools were built for young children who cannot cross the water to the village school.

TAO Philippines is incredibly proud of its all-Filipino team, who underwent rigorous training for this daring expedition. The training they provide in Edi’s words is “not just for compliance”. One, for instance, teaches how to communicate properly,  not just by correcting grammar or accent but by focusing on establishing connection and rapport with the guests, their colleagues and the islanders. “This, for us, is honest hospitality,” Edi adds.

With the recent boom of tourism in the Southeast Asian loop, TAO Philippines became one of the busiest. Taking advantage of the excellent business climate, it bought pieces of land, turning them into base camps. “It also allowed us to wean ourselves from the villages to avoid being intrusive,” Edi explains. TAO Philippines was then at its peak until supertyphoon Yolanda came. “It gave us a little bit of a slap in the face like [reminding us], ‘no, you’re not that special’,” he says,  remembering how the calamity wiped out their boats and camps and even claimed the life of one of their team members.

This wake-up call moved them to continue creating self-sustaining communities, hypothetically asking themselves, “What if there’s no more tourism”? As a response, they started securing their properties and thought of ways for the team to be more resilient. One of the islands they rebuilt is Camp Ngey Ngey (formerly Mangenguey Island), a typhoon-wrecked resort they rebuilt using their innovative bamboo architecture. They also came up with a savings programme for their employees that is released at the end of the year for them to buy raw materials for their homes or, say, a tricycle or motorbike that they can use for livelihood. “We had to teach our members how to use their income wisely,” Edi says.

Another challenge came when everything seemed to be in place: the pandemic. “It was another reset and much rethinking for us,” Edi says,  realising it’s time for a new game. “We are ready for TAO 2.0,” he adds, sharing a recent addition to their portfolio, the Sangat Island Dive Resort, which they now manage. “It’s one of the pioneering dive resorts in Coron, and we’re adding a bit of TAO’s fairy dust.” There are also plans to build a beach club in Duli Beach, El Nido (but was halted by the pandemic) and sustainably designed villas using their signature bamboo architecture on some of their base camps.

TAO Philippines’ remarkable and meaningful journeys are only possible because they are hosted by the men and women who grew up on the islands they explore. It was years and years of deepening relationships with these communities, so even with the TAO 2.0, the same core principles will surely continue.