Barranquilla and the Atlantic united by the conquest of business tourism

Destination table. It is the name of the public-private strategy between the Barranquilla Mayor's Office, the Atlántico Governor's Office, the Barranquilla Chamber of Commerce and Probarranquilla, they have put together to promote the city and the Department as a single entity where you can do business, but also to do quality tourism.

"We have come together more than anything in the tourism strategy and in the business tourism strategy, especially for attracting strategic events that allow us to bring Barranquilla and the Department closer to all those investors who can come to this territory to leave their grain of sand and to support the economic growth that Barranquilla and the Atlantic have experienced in recent years”, initially said Erika Grau Torres, Business Tourism Manager of Probarranquilla.

He added that to integrate public and private entities "in Probarranquilla we have the Technical Secretariat of the Destination Table, in which the Mayor's Office of Barranquilla, the Atlántico Governor's Office, the Chamber of Commerce and Probarranquilla are seated, where each one fulfills a function and it is the objective of this union. The public sector has the function of organizing the house, in everything that has to do with the first level tourist infrastructure; The Chamber of Commerce has the task of strengthening the entire local business fabric, the entire industry value chain, meetings in the tourism sector, and Probarranquilla has its last quarter mile, in which we work to promote the city and capturing events. These events also bring us tourists who stay two or three more days in the Department and that allow us to contribute to the economic benefit”.


"From Probarranquilla we have established goals for this year, we cannot fail to capture less than 20 events in this 2022. Occasionally events that are strategic, hopefully from the energy, health, renewable energy sector, which is very fashionable in recent years ; also in chemicals and plastics, services, construction and logistics and transport, which is vital and, furthermore, that we are an example at a national level as a city-port. We are bathed by types of water: river, swamp and sea. And that is a bit about how, with these attributes of the territory, we can capture top-level events to have visitors for the rest of the year. That is our goal from Probarranquilla”, said Grau Torres.

He ended by saying that the Petroleum Congress has been confirmed, which will take place in May of this year; the National Cardiology Meeting, which will take place in 2024 and the ICCA Meeting, "which is one of the most important organizations in the world that brings together decision makers of events at an international level and having it here in Barranquilla brings us closer to that decision maker; let's say that it puts us on the table of international destinations so that Barranquilla begins to raise the level in terms of its positioning”.

Janinne Pinedo, director of the Tourism and Business Cluster of the Barranquilla Chamber of Commerce, stated that the first element of the strategy “is to potentiate our strengths. And, in addition to those strengths, the strategic segments where we are strong. The tourism industry is the most desired worldwide because it is the one that moves the most money in the world; boosts 1.07 trillion dollars. If it were a country, it would be number 13 in the world. It is the tourist who comes with money, with per diems from companies, eats in the best restaurants, gets off at hotels. So, that's why our strategy of attracting events in the segments where we are strong”.

He considers that the segments where the Barranquilla and the Atlantic are strong are: energy, construction, health and logistics. “This strategy makes us much stronger, it differentiates us from all other destinations and normally the international event, for example, logistics, looks for where this segment is much stronger. And we use the strategy that is lived worldwide, which is business plus leisure. And we look for a way for those business tourists to stay two or three more days enjoying our territory and that has given us results”.

Katherine López, head of the Barranquilla District Tourism Office, said that “we have been strengthening all our tourist plans in the city. From what is gastronomy and our culture, where they can go to the museum and learn a little about Carnival, but at the same time they can take tours in Barrio Abajo, that neighborhood that has so much identity and so much culture in all its streets, in all its corners; They can make nature plans such as tours of the Magdalena River, bird watching, enjoying all the parks that we have in the city today. But Barranquilla is also strengthening its tourism products every day”.

“Barranquilla continues to be a city with a vocation for event and business tourism. That continues to be our greatest strength. Every day we see how we are growing and we are a national reference and today, at an international level, for those great events that we have carried out, such as the Central American and Caribbean Games; the Assembly of the IDB, the International Congress of Jurists, which have served to show us and to capture others such as the future Pan American Games of 2027”, he concluded by saying.

Pamela Solano, Undersecretary of Atlantic Tourism, stated that "in the Department we are betting on sustainable tourism, which has to do with rescuing the natural wealth that the ecosystem of our territory has, of the natural reserves, the beaches, we are looking Sea. And that is focused on the Atlantic Tourism Pact, which is the great project where the tourist infrastructure works come together with which we hope to increase the competitiveness of the territory and generate the opportunity for our tour operators, with the people natives, have a place where that employment associated with tourism is generated”.

“We are the capital of the Colombian Caribbean. It connects with Cartagena, it connects with Santa Marta, tourists come to us through our beaches, due to the wind conditions that we also have. So what we are doing is generating infrastructure so that when these people arrive they can live memorable experiences in the Atlantic and we are the obligatory stop for the transit of tourists that occur in the Caribbean, north of Colombia,” Lozano said.

In the call with the media, the following were present: Vanessa Botero; Senior Advisor of Procolombia; Katherine López, head of the District Office of Tourism; Pamela Solano, Undersecretary of Atlantic Tourism; Erika Grau, Business Tourism Manager of Probarranquilla; and Janinne Pinedo, director of the Tourism and Business Cluster of the Barranquilla Chamber of Commerce.