São Paulo – The Brazilian Tourism Institute (Embratur) wants to encourage 25% of the tourists who will come to the country to watch the matches of the 2014 World Cup to stay in Brazil after the world football championship. The objective is to progressively increase tourist flow in the country and the inflow of foreign funds into the tourist sector.
"In order to lengthen the duration of their trip to Brazil, our challenge is to present alternative routes. After watching one of the matches, a significant share of the tourists is going to lose access to the tickets, and this is an opportunity to work with destinations of great potential that are not well established yet," said in a press release Marcelo Pedroso, the Embratur’s Products and Destinations director.
According to Pedroso, the process of building and updating the country’s image is the result of record-high profits and dividends. "It is like a bank account: among receivables and payables, the important thing is the balance. And we surely possess qualities that exceed our shortcomings. We are selling the country of modernity, of technology, with strategic differentials in the international scenario, an exporting power, of vast cultural and natural diversity," said the director.
"In 2020, we want to be a country that tourists will leave already thinking of returning. Our objective is to have visitors grasp the range and intensity of living the experience of being in Brazil," he finished off.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
