From paradise to collapse? The intensification of tourism and tourist carrying capacity in the village of jericoacoara, ceará

Resumo

The village of Jericoacoara, located within the Jericoacoara National Park (PARNA), has been suffering from an overload of tourist visitation that compromises environmental preservation, local biodiversity, and carrying capacity. Given this context, this article aims to estimate the tourist carrying capacity of the village of Jericoacoara, in the state of Ceará, in light of the intensification of tourism that has occurred since the 2010s. Methodologically, we adopted the method of measuring physical, real, and effective carrying capacity proposed for natural parks, considering tourist visitation data, total visitation area, total daily opening hours to the public, average length of stay of visitors, and limiting factors, based on conditions in 2019. The results indicate that the current visitation scenario exceeds the actual and effective capacity of the site, even considering a hypothetical scenario of sustainable tourism, with a 20% reduction in tourist flow. Even so, in this scenario, there is a greater approximation between the number of visitors and the estimated sustainable limits. The conclusion was that there is a need for intervention aimed at the sustainable management of the village, through coordination between the government, the local community, and the tourism sector.