Goiás Velho: Sustainability through Tourism
by Bill Hinchberger
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Like New York and São Paulo, Goiás shares a name with the state to which it belongs. There the similarities end. The central Brazilian state of Goiás is a booming hotbed of agribusiness and cattle ranching. The 27,000-strong town by the same name was founded in 1727. Its growth fueled by a colonial-era gold rush, the town was all but abandoned after losing its status as state capital in 1937. Partly as a result, it retained its historic architecture and unique culture. Now it is using those features to attract tourists. In 2001 the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designated the town as a world heritage site. To differentiate it from the state, the city sometimes goes by the name Goiás Velho.
At 36, Santana is president of the state Green Party and member of the Goiás city council. He began his activist career as part of a movement to expel illegal wildcat miners from the region. Now he is leading a campaign to implement a state park that surrounds his hometown.
We caught up with Santana at the International Festival of Environmental Film and Video (FICA), hosted by the city of Goiás in June. Santana is the local coordinator of the annual event. Crowds estimated in the thousands descended upon this rural town to attend screenings and participate in parallel events that ranged from shows by pop stars like Jorge Benjor to a regional gathering of environmental journalists.
“Surplus: Terrorized into Being Consumers,” a Swedish condemnation of consumerism in the George W. Bush era, won the Cora Coralina grand prize and the press award. The competition featured over a dozen foreign films - counting entries from India, New Guinea, and Palestine. The prize for Best Feature Length Film went to “Life Running Out of Control,” a German documentary about genetic engineering. Also-rans included the Academy Award winner “Chernobyl Heart,” from Belorussia. “The cariocas (natives of Rio de Janeiro) are going to be jealous when they notice that an Oscar winner is being shown here before in Rio,” quipped Brazilian writer and director Zuenir Ventura, who calls Rio de Janeiro home.
BrazilMax’s interview with Santana
BrazilMax: This year marked the 6th edition of the FICA film festival. A town once known for wildcat mining is now home to an environmental film festival. How has the relationship developed between the town and the festival?
In the last few years, encouraged by the festival, for sure, but also by the campaign to win designation as a world heritage site, there have been efforts to increase the awareness of our historical, cultural and environmental assets. This is one of the few cities in the world that entered the 21st century not only with its architectural heritage in tact but also with its natural environment, culture and history preserved.
When we speak of sustainability and sustainable development, one of the key factors is that local people can never feel that they are being used. In the first FICA, the entire team of security guards, receptionists and support staff were hired from outside. The city felt humiliated, isolated, abandoned.
During the first editions of the festival, there was almost nobody from the city in the theater watching the films. They’d never had access to this type of leisure activity and culture; they were also a little afraid. After people started taking part, with the project “Se Liga no FICA” (Turn On to FICA), which takes films to the outskirts of town, a climate was created where the townspeople feel comfortable. Before, people felt invaded and embarrassed. Now the community helps make the festival happen. About 160-170 people from the city of Goiás are employed by the festival. People wear the festival t-shirt with pride.
That’s why the festival has brought a series of advances to the city.
BrazilMax: How does this mesh with the city’s vocation as a tourist attraction?
People understand that our potential for development is based on the cultural wealth of the city’s people. Preservation isn’t just for the sake of beauty, but because preservation is going to guarantee the potential for development. This is our asset, our attraction. For ecotourism, this is very important. Ecotourists want to leave their own realities behind to live in different ones – with different relationships to time, different cultures, and different environments. People must understand the value of their own history and culture. They will then maintain these assets to use them sustainably through tourism. Tourism generates income distribution and is socially fair if implemented in a socially responsible way. Of course, tourism can generate a series of problems, but if we put local interests first, we can improve the quality of people’s lives and develop economically while preserving our history, culture and environment.
BrazilMax: What’s the importance of tourism to the local economy right now?
The city of Goiás is a magnet for the surrounding region because we host the regional offices of state agencies for education, health, etc. So there’s tourism revenue generated by business travelers and others who come to use these services. Then we have our historical downtown that attracts tourists. So today tourism – adding tourism for business and services, ecotourism, cultural tourism, and educational tourism – is the activity that generates the most income for the city.
BrazilMax: The state governor recently approved a state park surrounding the city, and you are leading a group that is working to see the project fully implemented. The park would serve as an attraction for ecotourism, right?
Right. We have historical and cultural assets, including many that help tell the history of the state and its origins. And we have the architectural assets. The environmental assets add strength and potential to keep tourists here longer. They can experience the natural beauty and visit a waterfall - but also enjoy the town. We need to implement a tourism policy that unites these elements - natural beauty, historical beauty, local culture and traditions, religious events, and culinary traditions. The city of Goiás doesn’t have a lot of social problems or violence. The population is declining, not growing. We have a chance to implement a development model that can serve as an example for Brazil.
We need to establish well-considered public policies so that we don’t lose control of this process. We cannot grow in a disorderly fashion. We cannot ignore urban planning. Real estate speculation cannot dictate the rules. Sprawl cannot occupy areas within the nature reserve. The rivers and the environment cannot be degraded. The policy must place value on the local culture and establish rules for the way tourism operations are implanted. If we don’t establish public policies in along these lines, we may lose our status as a world heritage site.
Real estate speculation produces a sense of growth. We need to break with this idea of growth. Economic development has nothing to do with the territorial growth of the city. On the contrary. When sprawl creates underutilized spaces, you greatly increase the costs of management because these under-utilized areas have to receive the same investments in public services as places that are used responsibly.
If we don’t have the right public policies, we will begin to lose our essence and originality, as have places like Alto Paraíso and Pirenópolis.
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