The Minister of Cultures, Arts and Heritage, Consuelo Valdés; together with the Minister of Economy, Development and Tourism, Lucas Palacios, among other authorities, released a new plan to support the tourism sector and the creative industry.
The plan includes 4 axes of work, including business subsidies, credit facilities through the FOGAPE Reactiva programme, flexibilities in the Employment Protection Act and special programs in partnership with Banco Estado.
PAR Creative Industries
Thus, during the months of February and March, the Ministry of the Economy will make the first call for competition to access these subsidies totaling $55 billion. At this stage, $50 billion will go to the tourism sector and $5 billion to the culture and arts sector, benefiting more than 20,000 companies nationwide.
“PAR Creative Industries” will consist of an emergency subsidy of up to $3 million for companies in the creative sector, totaling $5 billion.
The focus of the instrument will be on companies that invoice some of the 63 ISIC codes of Creative Industries and also for non-profit organizations with “cultural rotation”, so that they can be beneficiaries.
In this sense, while 58% of creative enterprises are in the RM, for the distribution of PAR resources it was proposed that only 50% be distributed in RM, and the rest proportionally in the regions according to their number of creative companies and, in some cases, cultural agents and/or relevant initiatives.
“This is an unreleased program because of its size and scope. This is the first time that so many resources have been allocated to specific sectors that are extraordinarily hit, because this is the year of economic recovery. The first resources will be delivered during the first half of the year, which is going to be a very difficult semester, and as early as the second trimester, we will see a strong economic recovery as a result of the vaccination process,” said Economy Minister Lucas Palacios.
In the meantime, Minister Consuelo Valdés explained that “this is an important signal for the revival of the cultural sector, where these new resources that will come from the Ministry of Economy will serve to support companies related to the cultural sector”. In this regard, the Minister stressed that this news follows the line of the measures taken by this portfolio. “In 2020 we redirected part of the budget to implement a Support Plan, which allowed more than $15 billion pesos to be delivered. Added to this is the Emergency Fund, announced by the President for 2021, which will allocate more than an additional $18 billion for the sector, and also the 2021 Culture Funds, which have within their main emphasis the revival of the cultural system, with more than $26 billion for that goal.”
