Comparative analysis of tourism in Polo Seridó, Rio Grande do Norte, Brasil

Abstract

This study aims to carry out a comparative analysis of tourism among 4 municipalities of Polo Seridó (Caicó, Cerro Corá, Currais Novos and Lagoa Nova). Once the Tourism Offer Inventory was carried out in these 4 municipalities through a UFRN university extension project, through the students of the Tourism Course, where Currais Novos and Lagoa Nova were inventoried in 2016, and Cerro Corá e Caicó in 2017. The objectives of the article are: to elucidate the structure of the tourist supply of the polled municipalities of the Seridó Pole; to compare the evolution of the tourist ventures inventoried by Polo Seridó; and quantify the number of formal jobs in the tourist sector of the polled municipalities of Polo Seridó. The methodology is based on: delimitation of the temporal and spatial cuts; bibliographic and documentary survey; selection of data; and comparative analysis among the municipalities of Polo Seridó. Thus, it was verified that although tourism presents itself as an important regional economic activity, it still needs sectoral maturation and greater social and economic dynamism in the field of sustainability and employability.