THE CREATIVE ECONOMY, CULTURE AND GASTRONOMY CAN ATTRACT FOREIGN TOURISTS TO BRAZIL. THE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMISSION DISCUSSED THE MATTER AND PRESENTED PROPOSALS TO STRENGTHEN BRAZILIAN TOURISM. THE REPORT IS BY IARA FARIAS BORGES.
Among the suggestions to encourage the coming of foreign tourists to Brazil presented by the president of the Committee on Foreign Relations, senator Kátia Abreu, from the PP do Tocantins, are the elaboration of tourist routes in the Amazon; the use of embassies to promote the country abroad; and the organization of a plan for Brazilian tourism. These measures must include the dissemination of national culture and gastronomy.
According to the representative of Embratur, André Reis, for nearly 20 years Brazil receives around six million foreigners a year, of which nearly two million are Argentineans. By highlighting the cultural and gastronomic wealth of Brazil, senator Kátia Abreu defended a public policy for tourism. I can’t resign myself to seeing countries that are so small and with so little diversity, get so far ahead and we can’t move. It’s awesome, inadmissible! And I’m even more shocked when six million foreign tourists in 2004 and six million tourists in 2019.
Didn’t anyone see it during this entire period? What is the new strategy to face this, I ask Embratur, I ask the Ministry of Tourism? In defending the creative economy and citing typical dishes from the Vale do Ribeira region, in São Paulo, the researcher in cultural history, Carlos Pereira Júnior, emphasized that traditional populations still do not use knowledge for their own benefit.
They live with it every day, but when it comes to an undertaking, she goes there, opens her space and creates a pizzeria. Precisely because they told her that her reality is bad, that she’s linked to something poor, something outdated, that she left behind. Since travelers are looking for experiences, for the General Head of Embrapa Foods and Territories, João Veloso Silva, food research must be associated with cuisine and culture. Science alone does not cook.
We have a unique diversity in this country, extremely diverse cultures, and this interaction of Science in this multidisciplinarity associated with cooks will really provide a very big advance. Also participating in the debate were Roberto Nedelciu, president of Braztoa, Association of Tourism Operators; Leônidas Oliveira, Secretary of Culture and Tourism of Minas Gerais; and Chef Kátia Barbosa, creator of the feijoada cake, intangible heritage of Rio de Janeiro. Radio Senate, Iara Farias Borges.
