The Minister of Foreign Trade and Tourism of Peru, Roberto Sánchez Palomino, affirmed this Monday that his country is experiencing a true "agro-export boom" with record figures that already exceed pre-pandemic data, a symptom of its "macroeconomic stability."

"We are experiencing an agro-export boom, the regions of the country are feeling that the world demands their agricultural products," declared the minister in an appearance in which he took stock of what happened in 2021 and spoke of what is expected for this new year .

According to Sánchez, in these figures you can see the "macroeconomic stability", since "it has reached 30%, increasing to those of the year 2020 and even exceeding the exports of 2019".

Peru has established itself this year as the leader in Latin America as the country with the highest percentage of non-traditional exports, that is, those that are not minerals or hydrocarbons, reaching a record of almost 1.600 million dollars last September.

The country is, for example, the world leader in the production of blueberries, and closed 2021 with exports of this product 120,8% higher than those registered in September 2019. Shipments of avocados, asparagus or quinoa are also part of the food basket that the Andean country sends to the world.

"We are in a great moment full of opportunities to continue working," said the minister.

In this sense, the minister's objective for next year is to expand institutional strategies to reach small producers and give them an international boost, and indicated that the Second Agrarian Reform that the Government of President Pedro Castillo intends to carry out has this spirit.

Efforts to reactivate tourism

Sánchez was much less positive regarding the tourism data, a sector severely hit by the covid outbreak and the closure of international borders.

Before the pandemic, up to four million international tourists visited Peru and with the covid this number dropped to 400.000, and internal tourism also decreased by four its usual number.

"We are very sensitively concerned when talking about the tourism sector," Sánchez Palomino acknowledged this Monday.

The drastic drop in tourists has negatively impacted the country's economy, leading to job losses in a chain as diverse as that of this sector: travel agencies, porters, restaurants, hotels, transport or tour guides have been seriously affected .

The tourism sector was the third activity in contribution to Peru's gross domestic product (GDP) in 2019.

To try to improve this panorama, the country is promoting plans with local communities to reactivate the sector and the minister announced that they are considering incorporating tax incentives.

"We believe and are evaluating with the Ministry of Economy and Finance, the Executive Board of Tourism, a package of tax incentives, which can accompany this effort of the sector," said Sánchez.

The minister explained that since August urgent measures have been taken since there was "an institutional will to work in a coordinated manner," and negotiating tables were established with seven ministries and bringing together the public and private sectors.

In addition, in the second half of 2021, credit programs have been carried out to help 1010 tourism SMEs worth 78 million soles and thus reactivate the sector.

Tour guides and the craft union have also been helped with different plans that seek to alleviate the poverty that the pandemic has left in the country.