Chilean Federation of Tourism Enterprises asks to eliminate PCR test requirement to enter the country

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – One of the main issues that Chile’s Federation of Tourism Enterprises (Fedetur) has focused on since the reopening of the borders for the entry of international tourists to Chile has been to get the government and the health authorities to reduce the requirements for visitors to enter the national territory.

In the guild, they emphasize that the country is one of the nations that impose more conditions of entry, which in the opinion of the Federation, is a tremendous disincentive for those who want to come because, among other procedures, they must make the process of homologation of vaccines, which can take several weeks, and where Chile is the only country in the world that requires it.

But there are also additional problems that make entering Chile even more cumbersome, according to Fedetur. The obligation for passengers coming from abroad to take a PCR test upon arrival at the Santiago airport – in addition to the one required before boarding to travel to Chile – is causing delays of up to three hours to leave the air terminal when in other countries this procedure is much more expeditious since international tourists are only required to take a PCR test before boarding and not upon arrival at their destination.

“As a sector, we need to eliminate much of this bureaucracy to enter Chile so that the process is much more fluid and expeditious. Inbound tourism continues to be very restricted, and we urgently need to reactivate it due to its relevance for our industry. All the paperwork and formalities that passengers must go through to enter our territory discourage their arrival to the country”, states Ricardo Margulis, president of Fedetur.

The union representative adds that “it is essential that we begin to consider what other countries are doing in this matter, and extract the positive aspects to replicate them in Chile. Many countries do not require the PCR test upon arrival at the destination, but ask tourists for one before embarkation, which can take from 24 to 72 hours”.

“As an industry, it is difficult for us to understand why if we are one of the nations recognized for the good management of the pandemic, with a huge percentage of the population vaccinated against covid with at least two doses, we are the country that imposes more conditions to come. It impacts and harms us enormously because, in this context, many tourists choose not to visit us because of the obstacles and cumbersome procedures they have to carry out”, Margulis points out.

“Who is going to want to make a trip to Chile, if, in addition to all the requirements to enter, they must wait three hours or more at the Santiago Airport, which is how long the sanitary and customs procedures are taking today,” says Ricardo Margulis. “For the same reason, we ask the government to eliminate the requirement to have a PCR test when arriving in Chile and consider one before the boarding of international tourists, which can be 24 or 48 hours before boarding the plane”, concludes the president of Fedetur.

However, during the last time, Chile has reached record figures of contagion, where the positivity at country level has exceeded 20%, numbers that are not encouraging, so that the authorities, during the last weeks, have hardened the restrictions in different communes. Despite the above, there have been no modifications regarding borders or access to the country.