Tourism has suffered severe blows in recent years. The pandemic, the incompetent government, and then the violent protests in southern Peru. Regaining confidence in destination Peru has been extremely difficult, with many countries issuing travel alerts (Travel warning). We have been working for months with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism, and the private sector to scale up these efforts and show the world that we are a safe destination.
But nothing was learned. Now, the government is dealing a new blow to tourism, by declaring a state of emergency, under the (false) pretext of solving the problem of citizens’ insecurity. As a result, countries like the UK have already issued travel alerts for our country.
Tourism is an engine of decentralized economic and social development. Hundreds of thousands of families in Peru depend on it, especially small and medium-sized businesses, such as housing, restaurants, travel agencies, handicrafts, transportation, and others. All these entrepreneurs are suffering because tourism has not yet recovered to pre-pandemic levels.
Between January and August, only 1.6 million international tourists arrived in Peru, half (52.7%) of them compared to the same period in 2019. In 2022, domestic and inbound tourism were 44% and 54% below the pre-pandemic level, respectively. The GDP of restaurants and accommodations in the first half of the year was 13.3% lower than in the same period in 2019. These businesses, especially small and medium-sized businesses, continue to be hit hard. Today these businessmen are taking a new blow.
There is no strategy to combat the insecurity of citizens that our country suffers from, so the government declares a declaration of emergency in several areas in Lima and Solana Piura. The image aims to gain popularity and approval from citizens, but this will do little to combat crime, extortion, and murderers.
On the contrary, it will affect tourism and our already weak economy. The field is still leaning towards a recovery in the sector, as this affects confidence in the destination, fewer tourists will arrive due to travel alerts and thousands of restaurant workers, for example, will lose their jobs or see their income reduced.
Will the problem of insecurity among citizens be solved? Callao had 315 days of emergency in 2022 and what happened? On that occasion, the Office of the Ombudsman actually expressed its concern about the continuation of “an action (…) that did not contribute to solving the fundamental problems and causes of insecurity, while maintaining the suspension of the exercise of personal rights and freedoms.”
As former Interior Minister Carlos Basombrio has pointed out, what is needed is greater investment in intelligence and the operational capacity of the police to dismantle criminal organizations. Measures such as the state of emergency have already been used and have not stopped crime, but rather continue to increase.
It is urgent to solve the serious problem of citizens’ insecurity. But this must be done through a clear strategy, and not with announcements like this that not only solve nothing, but also affect hundreds of thousands of entrepreneurs and the tourism sector.
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