2023-07-01 15:20:19
“Unlike Guatapé, in Venice they prepared to be a tourist municipality and that it did not catch them as the saying goes “with their panties down”.
Last week I was in the Educational Park of Venice, Southwest Antioquia together with some journalist colleagues to hear about the Cerro Tusa Park project led by the mayor’s office of this municipality, the Antioquia Governor’s Office with the Activa company and the Comfama compensation fund.
I was struck by the data shared by the mayor of Venice, Óscar Andrés Sánchez, about how this park project is splitting the history of this town of less than 13,000 inhabitants in two. According to the mayor, before the announcement of this project, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, Venice had 125 beds available in hotels, by the end of this year they expect to have a thousand beds enabled. Of 7 hotels that it had before the pandemic, it now has 21.
Another of the businesses that has been born as a result of this project is that of handicrafts. Incredible as it may seem and despite having Cerro Tusa forever, the Venetians had not developed the tourist potential of the also known “Sacred Mountain”. As the mayor recounted, because they were used to having her by their side, the local inhabitants never realized their potential. A tourist who wanted to bring a Cerro Tusa-themed souvenir could not find it.
Now that is another economic sector that has emerged as a result of this project, which is nothing more than the economic spillover as a result of a project that in the case of Venice is Cerro Tusa: there are new hotels, restaurants, handicrafts and more are being formed tour guides.
One of the obligatory questions when projects of this type arise is how to mitigate the negative impacts that are generated: the increase in the cost of land and/or rents -because there are foreigners who want to come to live in these municipalities-, stress from public services such as the water, that as in Guatapé, there are seasons when the totality of water consumption cannot be guaranteed to the population.
The mayor’s response is that, unlike Guatapé, in Venice they prepared to be a tourist municipality and anticipate this type of situation so that they would not be caught as the saying goes “with their panties down”; In terms of water availability, the mayor stated that the municipality currently has enough water for its inhabitants but that Corantioquia has just approved a concession in the La Galápago stream that would serve as a reserve.
In tourism training, its officials were learning good practices for a month in PANACA. The mayor has sold the idea to its inhabitants so that they begin to develop tourist infrastructure: hotels, restaurants, handicrafts, etc., so that outsiders -as happens in Guatapé- are not the ones who set up the businesses, and leave the locals relegated.
The new Cerro Tusa Park will be enabled in the first quarter of 2023 and will be operated by Comfama initially for 15 years. The box is making an investment of 9,700 million pesos so that visitors have a connection with the earth, nature and the sky; where children and young people can learn about the geological wealth of the territory, ask questions and awaken a sense of curiosity.
Cerro Tusa will contribute to further mark tourism in the Southwest of Antioquia. The benefit will not only be for Venice but for the 23 municipalities of this sub-region where Jardín and Jericó have been commanding the parade.
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