TOURISM IN PANTANAL / MS: BETWEEN THE PANDEMIC OF COVID-19 AND THE BUSHFIRES

ABSTRACT

In March 2020, the World Health Organization - WHO recognized the Covid-19 pandemic situation, due to the high spread rates of the disease, causing the paralysis of representative economic, social and cultural sectors. The process of readjusting to reality prompted a group of researchers on tourism to understand the mechanisms arising from this historical and social period. This article aims to provide a diagnosis of the impacts of the pandemic by Covid-19 in the Pantanal of Mato Grosso do Sul, based on a comparative analysis of data for the years of 2019 and 2020, associated with tourism in the cities of Aquidauana, Corumba and Miranda - spatial delimitation of the investigation - and the intense bushfires that devastated the Pantanal in 2020. The methodology involved a comparative analysis of data from the productive sector of tourism, bibliographical, documentary survey, and interviews with public and private tourism agents. The pandemic and the bushfires contributed to a decrease in tourism in the Pantanal, but, after the adoption of biosafety measures by the WHO, shows a slow and gradual movement with small displacements, that is, an increase in local tourism, businessmen and tourism workers are organizing themselves for the resumption of activity, with the recovery of the environment and at the same time adapting the biosafety measures.