Rio de Janeiro, May 19 (EFE).- Brazil’s greatest tourist attraction is its diversity. It is reflected not only in its landscapes and culture, but also in the vibrant life of its favelas and the rich legacy preserved by its ancient indigenous communities.
The favelas have been the origin of cultural displays that have become symbols of Brazil, especially samba and Carnival dances, festivities born in the heart of the Afro-descendant community that the whole country has proudly embraced and taken on as common cultural expressions.
And this cultural richness is also a tourist attraction that attracts the attention of a growing number of foreign visitors and contributes to better living conditions in poor areas.
In Rio de Janeiro, the favelas opened to tourism in 1991. This opening “helped to break down prejudices that associated poor communities with violence,” says writer and academic Conceição Evaristo.
Evaristo, a leading figure in the fight against racism in Brazil, highlights the importance of tourism in favelas and other destinations that showcase Brazilian inequality.
According to her, tourism has served to show that although Brazil “lives in conflict and suffers from structural racism, it wants to overcome these problems and needs opportunities to do so.”
The Central Única das Favelas (CUFA), the country’s largest organization, estimates that there are already some 300 travel agencies in these most disadvantaged slums, where 16 million Brazilians live.
“We have about 300 travel agencies in the favelas, and they not only receive people, but they offer options to favela residents who want to travel and get to know other places,” says CUFA President Marcus Vinicius Athayde.
The message is shared by the president of the tourism promotion agency, Embratur, Marcelo Freixo, who said, “We do not want to sell an imaginary country. We want to offer a real country.”
Indigenous people, guardians of the forest
Another facet of the lesser-known “real Brazil” is offered by the country’s more than 300 indigenous ethnic groups, which preserve ancient languages, rituals, medicines, and knowledge.
Some indigenous communities are also opening up to tourism, to show visitors their vision of the world and how they protect the forest.
Indigenous forest warden Adriane Ianawa works as a guide in a project that offers tourists an immersion in a village close to Manaus, the capital of the state of Amazonas, in an experience that benefits local communities.
“It is important that people abroad know where we are and that we are willing to share our history,” Ianawa told EFE. Her ethnotourism project in Novo Airão attracts about 20 tourists daily, mostly Brazilians.
The work of indigenous people and their contribution to sustainability, as well as life in the favelas, are two pillars of Brazil’s new International Tourism Promotion Plan, which emphasizes the country’s enormous social and cultural diversity.
“There is no country in the world that offers as many options as Brazil,” said Duda Magalhães, president of the entertainment events promotion company Dream Factory and partly responsible for the plan.
This strategy has moved from campaigns that promoted Brazil as a destination of “beaches, samba, and carnival,” and seeks to increase the country’s global competitiveness by developing niches such as nature, cultural, social, gastronomic, ethnic, and adventure tourism, explained Magalhães.
In this way, the aim is to attract to Brazil people interested in being immersed in ancient cultures, in participating in socio-environmental projects, and in connecting with initiatives that value local entrepreneurship.
Last year, Brazil received 6.8 million foreign tourists, generating 7.3 billion dollars in income. Eight million tourists, a record number, are expected this year. EFE
Embratur supported Agencia EFE in the preparation of this content.