PARAMARIBO–Inbound Tour operator METS Travel & Tours launches a Jungle Spa in the upper Gran Rio region, through community development in the Suriname hinterland.

In the most remote part of the upper Gran Rio River area in the Suriname rainforest, about 12 participants from 6 villages recently gathered for one week of intensive training in making handmade body scrubs, bath soaps and massage oils. This unspoiled part of the rainforest is home to the Samacca tribe, descendants of runaway slaves with their roots firmly in Africa. They harvest nuts from from palm trees in the rainforest, each with significant substances which contribute to wellness products that can be classified as the best in the world.

These products are used at the Spa and offered to the guests of Awarradam Jungle lodge where METS runs a back-to-back full board tour program each Monday and Friday to this pristine area. Besides direct help by air transport to the schoolteachers and school materials, research has made clear that METS provides direct income to almost each family in this remote area of the rainforest by providing regular tourists who buy local souvenirs, and weekly payment to several  cultural groups for their dance performance and the elderly people for their demonstrations at the village sightseeing tours and income by buying of local produced vegetables plus a financial contribution of each tour to the village account.

When guests travel with METS travel & Tours they directly support a true sustainable tourism organization. METS started her first tour on September 17th 1992, witch establish a history of almost 20 years. The company marks its 50th anniversary on January 13th 2012 and has laid out an extensive celebratory program, which will be highlighted in DevSur soon.

With over 80 percent of its original forest untouched, Suriname is famous for its dedication to nature preservation. The interior consists of a magnificent nature with towering, wide, meandering rivers with impressive rapids and enchanting sounds at night; all of this forms part of the Amazon rainforest. Suriname located at the middle of the Guyana shield in between former British Guyana en French Guyana is often also called: “The Green Caribbean”.

(METS press release)