Chillán Chamber of Commerce agrees to create a regional tourism corporation – La Discusión 2024-07-07 18:07:14

The board of directors of the Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Tourism and Services of Chillán-Ñuble agreed on Monday to begin the process of creating a regional tourism corporation, a private entity that aims to boost the development of the sector and move faster in overcoming gaps.

On Radio La Discusión, the president of the Chamber of Commerce, Alejandro Lama, revealed yesterday that, “the creation of a tourism corporation for Ñuble is being studied, in which the guilds of that category, plus the related authorities, will participate. It is something that we want to lead as a Chamber, to create and give life to this corporation.”

The leader said that the idea was born from the experience of a similar entity in Valparaíso, “from which we have obtained the necessary inputs to be able to replicate it in our region, since it is very necessary here.”

He commented that “what exists today is a tourism board chaired by Sernatur and which has been joined by some tourism chambers, such as those of Valle las Trancas and San Fabián de Alico, as well as the Chamber of Commerce of Chillán. But it is a consultative body, not a decision-making body. And we want to have a corporation that has greater weight and that, in addition, can opt for financing to achieve objectives that, from our perspective, are of interest.”

He clarified that one of the major differences that the future corporation will have compared to a trade association is that this entity “will be able to access public funds to develop projects, for example, international promotion actions, which is a challenge for our Valle Las Trancas-Nevados de Chillán destination, since, unfortunately, central level decisions do not prioritize it. With this corporation we will be able to access funds and take charge of how to promote in the markets that interest us.”

In this regard, he explained that the unions are prevented from receiving public funds. “So, this forces us to create a parallel company, which has a clear objective, where our Chamber of Commerce participates and of course, the relevant actors of tourism in the region, the unions of San Fabián, Las Trancas, Cobquecura, Quillón, etc. And from there, also have the public actors at this table, that is, the mayors, the regional governor and the sectorial authorities, such as the regional director of Sernatur and the regional minister of Economy, among others. All of them should be on the board of this tourism corporation,” Lama said.

He also stressed that this event will also improve communication between public and private actors, which will also help to address the challenges facing the region in promoting tourism, such as enabling the Chillán airfield to receive international flights.

“Our board of directors made a pre-agreement to continue moving forward with this idea. So our mission today is to get to work on this, so that within six months we will have this Ñuble tourism corporation established with legal personality,” he added.