The phenomenon of Tourism Villages is increasingly widespread. Especially in the Instagram age, now many people want to visit various Instagram-able places. In addition to healing from fatigue, it continues to exist in the virtual world by updating Instagram stories pages and feeds.

However, developing a tourist village is not easy. There are many things to consider and prepare. Starting from human resources, infrastructure and also funding sources. The rise of this tourist village is the main attraction to investigate further how to seek the formation of a tourist village, what obstacles are, and how to overcome them.

To find out how the community and the Karangrejo village government built this tourist village, Zubaidah Nur Oktafiani, a Communication Department student, chose it as a theme to complete her final assignment as a student. Empowerment Communication in Improving the Welfare of Tourism Village Communities in the Borobudur Magelang Region is the theme. Zubaidah explained this in a monthly discussion organized by the Center for the Study and Documentation of Alternative Media (PSDMA) NADIM of the Communication Department at the Islamic University of Indonesia (UII) on Thursday, June 9, 2022.

She recounted the most important steps the village government and community had to take were planning, including exploring village potential, making a master plan of development plans, and forming supporting organizations.

According to Zubaidah, several basic principles are often neglected to consider when forming a tourist village. In the establishment of the Karangrejo Borobudur tourism village, the principles that are maintained and applied are, among others, equality, participation of all components of society, and independence without relying on assistance from the government or other parties, and the principle of sustainability.

There are seven village government efforts toward the development of tourist villages. The first is that the Village conducts human resource development through educational activities, skills training, discussions and comparative studies. Second, the Village cooperates with various parties. For example, partnerships with government agencies, NGOs, travel agents, and even state companies.

In the third effort, the Village also organizes government activities in the Village by holding meetings, annual events, and also meetings. Meanwhile, the fourth effort made by the village government is to strengthen the image and promotion through online and offline means.

These four efforts ultimately support how the fifth effort works effectively. The village hosts festivals or other activities that attract visits and popularity. Apart from festivals, for example, volleyball matches and cultural festivals are also held regularly.

Of course, this sixth effort is also important to support other efforts. This sixth effort is also carried out to support tourism. This effort was made to form a citizen organization as a tourism support system. The seventh effort is to partner with universities. Some partner campuses are ISI, UGM, UNY, Sahid Tourism School, UMS, etc.

The positive impact of community empowerment in the Karangrejo tourism village can be seen in several ways. According to Zubaidah, for example, is the impact of institutional improvements in the village scope, other improvements such as improving the business climate, improving income in the economic sector, improving the environment, for example by increasing public awareness of clean and healthy living that supports clean tourist sites. There is also an impact by increasing the standard of living of the community and improving the community’s social conditions, which are becoming more cohesive with the existence of several community institutions that support tourism.