Goal of the aircraft seen in the Santos Dumont airport in Rio de Janeiro (Pilar Olivares / Reuters)
Prevented from repatriating an amount of 351 million reais held in Venezuela because of distortions in the exchange, Gol airline is considering cutting the route between Sao Paulo and Caracas, which operates since 2007.
According to a report published by the newspaper S.Paul Sheet the Thursday, the company has decreased from 28 to 16 the number of weekly flights to the South American country since 2014 and now is considering further cuts. "In this context of crisis and rise in the dollar, there is no denying that if we do not find a solution [to the impasse in Venezuela], we have to wonder if the flight will be maintained," says Alberto Fajerman, director of Institutional Gol Relations.
In Venezuela, the exchange system is quite complex to work with different conversion rates and be controlled with an iron hand by the Nicolas Maduro government. Venezuelan law requires businesses to sell the tickets in bolivar, the local currency. Of this money reverts to spending in the country itself and the surplus is transformed into dollar to be repatriated by the companies. In 2012, companies could repatriate money from a preferential rate of 4.3 bolivars per $ 1. In 2013, the conversion rate increased to 6.3 bolivars per $ 1. This year, the government changed again conversion, this time of 12 bolivars per $ 1.
TAM also operates the same route once a week has blocked 161 million reais. The company declined to comment on the matter, but not the company's site already offers flight option straight to Caracas.
The problem of repatriation of funds, linked to falling occupancy of flights, has already led to Air Canada and Alitalia to stop the route to Caracas. According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), passenger traffic in the country fell 8.5% in 2014, going against the upward movement in Latin America.
