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| Vítor Hugo, João Pessoa's Secretary of Tourism Photo: Fabiano Vidal |
Check out the interview:
Secretary Vitor Hugo, in your understanding, what are the main factors that have contributed to the increase in the number of tourists in João Pessoa in recent years?
Well, for me, it's largely a result of the investments made by Mayor Cícero Lucena. We understand that tourism is built on essential pillars: infrastructure, urban mobility, landscaping, the environment, and especially, safety. Strengthening tourism is a valuable effort that reaps the rewards of these investments. Furthermore, the participation of the Secretariat of Tourism in major national and international fairs, like the recent one in Portugal, is crucial. At these events, we establish very good partnerships with airlines, and we manage to sell, in a good sense, the city of João Pessoa and the state of Paraíba very well.
With the increase in the number of tourists, a worsening of traffic in the city has been noticed. What measures are being planned to improve traffic flow during the high season?
Indeed, unfortunately, we are dealing with important, structural works here. You see that João Pessoa, Cabedelo, and the federal highway are affected by works from DNIT [National Department of Transport Infrastructure] that have been ongoing for over 10 years, this tripling [of lanes]. This causes a very big problem; people can't flow through this creation, this construction of these overpasses. But we are hopeful that this will be completed in the next two years; there's a promise from DNIT for this car flow to improve. Along with this, we also noticed structural drainage and basic sanitation works by the state government on crucial streets and sections. Tancredo Neves, for example, is one of those that also created this traffic bottleneck. But all of this is temporary; these investments are necessary for the city to grow as a whole. Soon, all this road infrastructure will be resolved, and we are betting heavily on this traffic project, which will bring benefits to the population soon.
From your point of view, has the tourism development of João Pessoa been affected by real estate speculation?
I don't think so. I believe that real estate speculation grows and comes naturally. I'll give an example like the city of Cabedelo, where I was mayor for two terms. We were able to see that when a city makes significant investments in urbanization, its waterfront, and strong security – which is what Cícero has been doing here – it's normal for real estate speculation to increase and property values to rise. Today, João Pessoa is the darling of Brazil, with one of the most valuable waterfronts in Brazil and the Northeast.
So, I believe this real estate appreciation is a result of this great growth in tourism in the state of Paraíba, in partnership with the state government, but mainly in the capital, the city of João Pessoa.
Secretary, at the same time that João Pessoa has gained national prominence as a leading tourist destination, news of environmental problems, such as the discharge of sewage into the main beaches, have been reported in the media. What is needed to solve this problem that has worried tourism professionals so much?
Look, even though this environmental issue is under the purview of the environment secretariat and is being addressed in relation to it, the Secretariat of Environment, led by Secretary Elíseo, has been strongly fighting these crimes of clandestine connections, which clearly cause the pollution of our beaches. But as tourism officials, we must be attentive and concerned about this. What we do is this daily, round-the-clock monitoring so that we can very soon have this issue resolved. We are monitoring it, and we see that one of the major bottlenecks for pollution on our beaches today is the Jaguaribe River. It is completely, possibly one of the main polluters of the beaches today. And I'll also say this, there, the city, the Bessa neighborhood, like Cabedelo, the small beach of Intermares, every year, when it rains heavily and the tide is high, the riverside dwellers, who are those residents living by the riverbanks, who have these clandestine connections, thus polluting the river, they need to open that channel there, which ends up polluting our beaches. But I have already called, already summoned Mayor Cícero Lucena, he is very worried about this, and we know how to solve this problem, which needs to be done with multiple hands. It is necessary to unite the state government, the city of João Pessoa, and the city of Cabedelo and the city of Santa Rita, the metropolitan region as a whole, where the river is born and reaches Intermares, so that we can, with multiple hands, solve this pollution problem definitively, which is mainly by ending the pollution of the Paraíba River, the Jaguaribe River.
Secretary, some time ago, Mayor Cícero Lucena mentioned a beach widening project for João Pessoa. Is the project still on the agenda? How has the city hall analyzed the issue of beach widening in Natal, for example, which has shown some problems already?
What happened in Natal made it clear that doing a project without planning can be detrimental to the city. And now we've seen in Ponta Negra, there in Rio Grande do Norte, a serious problem with the widening because they didn't do the drainage, and there's no water outlet there, and today people don't even have access to the beach they had before. In João Pessoa, Cícero has the vision that a beach widening project could be healthy, but today there is an agreement, a term of agreement among the entire metropolitan region, coastal cities, that the Preamar project is being coordinated by the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office and highly credible entities, such as the Federal University of Paraíba, as well as global environmental preservation organizations. This project is almost ready and should be presented still this year, its first phase, where this project precisely consists of making the necessary interventions to stop the tide's advance in appropriate locations based on studies.
So, neither Mayor Cícero nor the mayor of any other city will undertake any type of intervention, especially in the Bessa neighborhood, which you are following the problem there, without the presentation and analysis of the Preamar project, to ensure localized interventions that minimize impacts on neighboring cities or cause the least possible problems with nature. So, this Preamar project will bring exactly what João Pessoa needs so that we can make interventions in the right place and these problems are resolved as soon as possible.
Regarding the events tourism segment, are there any plans from Setur [Secretariat of Tourism] for this sector that helps combat the seasonality of leisure tourism?
Events tourism is very important. For this year, we are preparing, and I'm telling you this firsthand, to bring the Natal Luz [Christmas Lights] from Gramado here for the second half of November and the first half of December, a period when we still have low hotel occupancy. By bringing Natal Luz, which is a grand event and will be held at Parque da Lagoa, this project is already under development, we will be able to attract visitors in November and December and continue to strengthen this project of attracting people.
For your information, the city of Gramado receives a large part of its tourism, 5 million people per year, and a significant portion of this tourism comes from Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, which is very close to us. So, by bringing this event here, to João Pessoa, which will probably be the first year this year, in November, we will be able to attract all this closer tourism: Natal, Recife, Pernambuco, Fortaleza will come here to attend the event instead of going all the way to Gramado.
So, we have this plan. We also have the plan to do the pre-São João [pre-Saint John's Festival]. We know that our São João can't compete with Campina Grande or Bananeiras; those are cities that have excelled with big events, with big festivals in this pre-São João period. And we will do what worked with the pre-Carnaval, the Carnaval da Gente. We can't compete with big cities in terms of Carnaval, so we created the pre-Carnaval, which is an absolute success today.
And we will also do, here in João Pessoa, the pre-São João, which we are already scheduling for May, the end of May, so that we can precisely showcase this wonderful festival, which is São João, one month before the main festivities, so that João Pessoa can also receive more tourists and residents can experience this great moment with major attractions. And Cícero, rightly so, being a visionary mayor, has already brought this São João to the beach in January, for the Beach Festival, which is the Summer São João, and there are over 80,000 people there on Tambaú beach, also enjoying this São João in the summer month.
Anyway, we are very attentive, especially to the growth of this tourism hub in Cabedelo/Lucena/Intermares, which will bring practically 14,000 more beds, and we have to be concerned about this to prevent what happened in Rio Grande do Norte, where hotels on Via Costeira are truly almost all abandoned due to lack of people. So, we are very concerned about maintaining the quality of tourism now so that people keep coming back to visit João Pessoa.
In your opinion, does João Pessoa need new facilities to meet the demand of the events sector?
Without a doubt, without a doubt, we need new facilities. We have a large facility, but precisely as I mentioned just now, the Cabo Branco Polo. One of the resorts there, in the Cabo Branco Polo, will have the capacity, it seems it will already host the Réveillon [New Year's Eve], one of these resorts, one of these hotels, where it can host up to 5,000 people. So, we are very confident about this. We need to have these spaces so they don't remain idle and we can continue receiving tourists.
But besides that, we will have religious tourism, and we are investing very heavily now in the city center to revitalize the entire area. We will strengthen tourism, especially in terms of parking, as we see that a major problem in the center today is not being able to park. So, it's no use making any kind of investment in the center if we don't realize that garage buildings are urgently needed there, in partnership with private companies, public and private, so that we can have more safety and precisely have a place to receive these people in the city center.
You ended up anticipating my question, which was precisely about the historic center. How to make it more attractive? How about the Central Market, for example, which could be a great tourist attraction, considering that gastronomy is part of a region's culture?
Yes, Cícero is very concerned about this. He already has a complete project for the revitalization of the public markets, not only in the city center but also the Tambaú market will have a beautiful revitalization in that area. We will replicate the gastronomic street model we created here in Miramar and also implement it in Tambaú and the historic center. And we need to; the markets are a key driver of revenue. I recently visited the public market in São Paulo, and you are enchanted by a market with that quality. I think that's what Cícero wants: to provide more quality to the vendors so they can receive more people and capitalize on the gastronomy, which is very strong in our city, the capital of Paraíba, in João Pessoa.
And what about safety in the historic center?
Safety is an essential pillar and is part of the historic center revitalization project. It's not enough to focus only on the beauty and visitation; safety is paramount for any city that works with tourism. If you come to a city and get mugged on your first visit, you won't come back to that city. So, Cícero has this perspective; he is investing heavily in safety, in equipment, in public hiring. Cícero is ready and aware of João Pessoa's growth and knows that we will need to transform João Pessoa into the safest city in Brazil, in the Northeast, especially in Paraíba. João Pessoa will become the safest city because it's the city that receives the most tourists in the state of Paraíba today.
Finally, Secretary, what are the future projects of the Secretariat of Tourism to continue boosting tourism in João Pessoa in the coming years?
In my interview today, I ended up talking about these important projects, like the pre-São João, which we are already planning. Another very important project we will undertake is this Natal Luz. We will be the first capital in the Northeast to have literal snow, it will be João Pessoa, there in Tambaú. It's a beautiful project; I'm anticipating it here for you.
Besides that, the Secretariat of Tourism doesn't just do this events tourism work. We are here qualifying, we are preparing the entire tourism trade. You can see now, we are working on a bill with taxi drivers to create "taxiturismo" [taxi tourism]. App-based car drivers will also participate in retraining programs for tourism. We offer preparatory courses here for everyone so that we can receive tourists better and better. And this includes a bilingual school; we have courses here for people to speak Spanish or English, because there's no point in tourists arriving here and not being able to communicate in the city. So, we are, the city hall, through our Secretariat, is offering these preparatory courses, which are of fundamental importance for the growth of the receptive capacity in our city.