Belo Horizonte
Founded in 1897, Belo Horizonte is considered to be one of the first modern planned cities in Brazil. With a population of 2.5 million, the city combines privileged geographic location, history associated with national culture formation and collaborative calling. Emersed within its rich history is its food culture. During the 18th-cenurty gold rush, Belo Horizonte became a multicultural hub, with miners from all over the world flooding to the city in search of gold and other precious metals. As a result of limited food supplies, a creative and open knowledge-exchange was born and can be seen in the influence of Brazilian, Portuguese and Africans dishes on regional food. Today, the service and gastronomy sector represents 86% of the city’s GDP.
Belo Horizonte has a wide calendar of events partially or entirely dedicated to workers of the creative field. The Family Agriculture Fair – AGRIMINAS, promotes regional products from the craft agro-industry and offers qualification opportunities for growers and those settled through the land reform. The International Coffee Week is also a prevalent event, strategically held in the capital of the State with the largest coffee production in Brazil. This international exposition includes everyone involved in the coffee production and supply chain, not only valuing their contribution, but also looking at long-term sustainability within coffee-growing.
Internationally viewed as a gastronomic destination, the city has a talented gastronomic sector and one that is supported by both local and private initiatives and policies with the aim of preserving traditional cuisine while seeking evolution and innovation within the industry. Implemented by the government, the National Access to Technical Education and Job Programme provides a number of courses teaching sommeliers, hostings skills, cooking and servers techniques. In conjunction with this, the Hackatur initiative incentivises new business models in the tourism chain and promotes the union of public and private agents, aiming at improving the competitiveness of the city as a smart tourist destination.
As a Creative City of Gastronomy, Belo Horizonte envisages:
- promoting the productive inclusion of entrepreneurs and communities by means of the Creative Horizons Project;
- improving the business environment, formalization and compliance with food security standards, by providing greater training opportunities for workers, as well as by valuing the gastronomic culture of the city's outskirts;
- encouraging international exchange by means of an annual international seminar and the bi-annual publication of the Alimenta Magazine;
- strengthening locally based Gastronomic Tourism;
- developing the interface amongst creativity, heritage and tourism, by means of the Modernist Route to establish institutional cooperation with cities for architecture and design, and expanding the debate and advancing smart, collaborative heritage management solutions.
