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Challenges For The Development Of Luxury Tourism In Brazil
1. Economic Challenges
According to Bart & Joseph (2006), Brazil offers high costs of transport, sports, entertainment, accommodation, meals and nightlife. This is due to the fact that most of the labor, equipment and materials used are externally sourced since they do not belong to the local tourists' sites (Wharton University, 2006). So overdependence on international or external sourcing would really hamper the comfort of expenditure-conscious tourists that could be attained from their goods and services (Schindler, 2008).
2. Environmental Challenges
This can also be perceived as ecological challenges. Since nature and landscape form rich content of Brazil's tourism, most of the tourist's developments have most suited in areas with vast ranges of flora and fauna (Dixon, 2009). However, it has been reported that due to weak tourism policies, most of the ecosystem have seriously been damaged thus reducing Brazil's efforts towards achieving luxurious eco-tourism (Dixon, 2009). Moreover it has been evident that some of these tourists' hotels were established in areas which are sensitive to tourists' reservations like mangrove swamps and coral reefs. This really demoralizes those tourists who are conscious of environment (Bart & Joseph, 2006).
Therefore much land is being turned into tourist's infrastructures. The worst part of this comes when there is no consideration given to developing the flora and fauna (Marder, Cassares & Zuniga, 2000). So nature tourists would find it less luxurious with such damage to ecosystem. Connecting this with poor sewerage system in Brazil, it would be quite hard to achieve the luxurious tourism following the fact that litter and waste water, even from tourist facilities, are poorly managed thus affecting the whole environment from land to water species thus affecting attainment of luxurious nature tourism (Marder, Cassares & Zuniga, 2000). On the other hand, stench smells from such sewages and garbage also lowers the quality of air breathed by tourists thus reduces the comfort (Schindler, 2008).
3. Logistics and legal challenges:
Currently Brazil's tourism sector does not really have proper, logical, constitutional procedures and policies for evaluation purposes (Bart & Joseph, 2006). In addition, Brazil would face challenge to attaining luxurious tourism due to unsatisfactory regulations and control of tourism services as well as poor establishment of productive chain structure (Andrew, 2006).
4. Social Challenges
4.1 Security Challenges
According to Andrew (2006), it has been reported that security is still poor in Brazil. This can be supported with frequently witnessed violence in nightlife, restaurants and hotels (Bart & Joseph, 2006). However, a few tourist sites like Amazonas and Para' states show some improved security (Reagan, 2009). So it would be quite imperative to argue that poor security would still contribute to low luxury standards in Brazil's tourism (Reagan, 2009).
4.2 Sex Tourism Challenges
According to (Bart & Joseph, 2006), initial international and local tourism advertisements were dominated with young women who are half naked, in bathing suits and use of women slogans. This really made it luxurious for sex tourists who were really focused on young children and women for sexual activities (Schindler, 2008).However since it was seen as a source of various social problems like sexually transmitted disease infections, rape, physical abuse, violence against women among others, this form of advertisement was banned (Wharton University, 2006). So the stringent legislations and policies, exercised by promotion bodies and travel agencies, on this kind of tourism have really hampered the attainment of luxurious sex tourism in Brazil. This is because the two bodies are required to use the Brazilian natural and cultural resources to promote its tourism abroad (Bart & Joseph, 2006). On the other hand harsh legislations on child abuse on sexual matters have also contributed to reduced luxury, from the perspective of tourists, in Brazil's tourism (Dixon, 2009). However, generally, it has been continuously witnessed that some hotels and resorts have been defiant and continues to recruit sex workers mainly targeting tourists. This has also hampered luxurious tourism, from the perspective of government, expected to be developed in Brazil (Dixon, 2009).
4.3 Employee-Job Challenges
Basically Brazilian tourism industry is dominated by young, cheap, insecure, unprofessional and low quality workers (Bart & Joseph, 2006). This has led to poor ratings of employee services. In the perspective of tourists, there are great negative feelings on the competency and luxury associated with services provided by such employees (Reagan, 2009). So this would really hamper the attainment of luxurious tourism in Brazil, not that they like it, but because the majority of Brazilians are poor and cannot attain the required tourism professions needed meet the luxury expected by the tourists (Bart & Joseph, 2006).
In addition, the dynamics of tourism industry in Brazil has resulted in poor employment conditions (Rogers, 2010). In this context, most of the tourist employees are on casual or on temporary contracts and may be fired at any time. However, even those who are on full contract do not receive benefits which are associated with full employment. Therefore this has led to increased employees demoralization which in turn hampers the luxury expected in this industry. On the other hand, most employees seem to know their legal rights; a fact that has greatly necessitated frequent court cases (Bart & Joseph, 2006). Analytically, it is reported that such events often have paralyzed tourist operations hence hampering the luxury standards expected in the tourism industry in Brazil (Bart & Joseph, 2006).
In addition, tourist jobs in Brazil are characterized by long service hours, standing and odd hour services (Rogers, 2010). On the other side, employees frequently come into contact with secondary smokes, fumes, excess alcohol consumption and sexual activities attributed to sex tourists. These collectively have created high health risks, especially in women, where heart complications and contraction of HIV has been reported. Consequently, tourism continuously looses their experienced employees to death cases and resignations due to poor health (Bart & Joseph, 2006). As a result it would be quite difficult for Brazil to achieve the luxurious tourism needed.
4.4 Professional Challenges
Just as already mentioned, tourism industry in Brazil faces much challenge when it comes to workers' professionalism. This is due to the majority's low knowledge or experience with this sector (Dixon, 2009). Given that this industry is characterized by poor employment conditions, there has been increased employee turn over with maximum working duration spanning to ten years (Bart & Joseph, 2006). This has really made most tourist companies not positively consider training or retraining of their employees since they can resign at any time leaving the industry with liability. So this has resulted in a continuous pool of unskilled and less professional employees. Consequently, this would really hamper the luxury standards expected in this industry.
4.5 Accommodation Challenges
The accommodation facilities in Brazilian tourism industry comprise large hotels, resorts (Ikkos, 2004). However, various surveys indicate that none or very few hotels have been rated as "luxury". This is worsened by the fact that the international community also has not taken any steps towards developing star hotels in Brazil as majority of these investments are either locally or regionally carried out (Ikkos, 2004). Similarly, researches have indicated that the effectiveness of star is not yet evident in Brazil. This follows the fact that from18, 000 hotels, only 26 have already been certified as star (Bart & Joseph, 2006)This situation has worsened following the fact that local and regional investors focus only on increasing the number of rooms but not the quality thus rendering accommodation facilities inadequate of ISO or Ecotourism standards (Dixon, 2009). Consequently these conditions would really thwart their efforts towards achieving luxurious tourism expected by both local and international tourists. Similarly, poor link between restaurants, bars and tour operators also signifies less luxurious tourism in Brazil. In this regard, the luxurious influence such bars and restaurants could have on tourists, by providing what is within the tour operators' package, is hard to come by due to such poor connection (Abrahao, et al., 2010).
Analytically, it has been revealed that most of Brazilian tourist hotels and restaurants lack the reservation system connecting them with tour operators. So tourist can be accommodated but not provided with goods and services indicated in the operators' deals (Reagan, 2009). On the other hand, Brazilian agricultural sector and manufacturing sectors lack proper links between them and the hospitality industry which commonly handles tourists. So this has led to inadequate provision of tourist food products and other services hence this would really hamper the luxury needed in the tourism industry due to increased dependence on foreign sourcing which is associated with reduced reliability and availability (Abrahao, et al., 2010).
During the accommodation, tourists are prone to accessing only local media and entertainment services. However, the taste and preference of tourist are inclined to global scales of entertainment. So this factor would also make it difficult for Brazil to achieve luxurious tourism expected by tourists (Abrahao, et al., 2010). Moreover the fact that most of Brazilian tourist hotels lack proper database system, which can clearly show their services to tourist, make it quite difficult for them to attain the luxury needed in this industry. This is also worsened by the fact that there are only a few organized companies which can amicably handle tourists on their arrival in the country or at the tourists' sites thus making transportation, transfers and excursions services quite unsatisfactory (Bart & Joseph, 2006).
4.6 Health and Sanitation challenges
Concerns of poor sanitation, low quality water, poor urban planning and hawkers problem have been reported in this industry especially in night-life, tourist bars and restaurants (Taylor, 2007). This has really threatened health conditions in Brazil's tourism with occasions of cholera sanitation complications being witnessed. So unless these conditions are improved, no tourist would rate tourism in Brazil being luxurious (Bart & Joseph, 2006).
4.7 Craftsmen Challenge
Since luxurious tourism is associated with access and viewing of various art and crafts works, Brazil face inadequate talented and skilled craftsmen who can creatively come up with variety of designs to fit the various luxurious taste of tourists visiting the country (Wagner, 2009). In this context, most tourist sites in Brazil have inadequacy in these cultural elements thus depending on regional sources (Wagner, 2009). In addition international tourists find it quite difficult to interact with craftsmen when they need to purchase the products thus lowering the luxury which could be extracted from this area of tourism goals (Schindler, 2008). This is because of language barrier between the craftsmen, artists and tourists. This is also true of both local and regional tourists who finds it expensive to afford the craft products.
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