by Nema Etheridge for GlobalAtlanta

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport’s ability to welcome foreign dignitaries is challenging Miami’s dominance as a gateway to Latin America, according to Manuel de Barros, protocol officer at the Atlanta facility.

Mr. de Barros, who is in charge of delivering topnotch treatment to VIPs arriving at Hartsfield-Jackson, discussed in a video interview with GlobalAtlanta the importance of Hartsfield’s protocol office to Atlanta’s ambitions in becoming an international business center.

“You don’t exist as a major city in this country, or in the world, if you don’t have international air service,” Mr. de Barros said. “Once you’ve got that international service, then it’s a question of how easy it is for [foreign officials] to work with you.”

Establishing Hartsfield’s protocol office in 2002, made the airport more welcoming to Atlanta’s consular corps, who had found entering the United States or receiving foreign dignitaries increasingly difficult as airport security measures tightened after Sept. 11, 2001, Mr. de Barros said.

Extending airport escorts or VIP service to visiting dignitaries became especially important to Atlanta’s reputation as it declared in late 2003 its pursuit of the secretariat of a proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas, which put it in direct competition with Miami.

While negotiations for a free trading bloc in the Americas have stalled, Atlanta officials continue to court Latin American business interests, and Hartsfield’s relationship with local consuls, who act as liaisons to their home countries, has helped raise Atlanta’s profile in the Americas.

“We are getting more and more dignitaries coming through here, not even staying here, who come because their consulate has told them, ‘Don’t go over Miami, you don’t need that headache,’" Mr. de Barros said.

He suggested that the Miami International Airport, which is undergoing expansions to its North and South terminals, is not as up-to-date or as customer-friendly as Hartsfield-Jackson.

While Hartsfield-Jackson is the busiest passenger airport in the world, welcoming 85.9 million travelers in 2005, only 6.7 million of those travelers were international, according to airport statistics.

Miami, on the other hand, processed 14.2 million international travelers in 2005, almost half its total number of 31 million passengers.

But with the opening of new international routes by Delta Air Lines Inc., Hartsfield-Jackson is expanding its global reach, currently servicing 71 international destinations in 42 countries. Mr. de Barros said he expects to see approximately 20 new countries added before 2007.

Since November, Delta has added 14 new routes between Atlanta and Latin America that have prompted the protocol office to issue Spanish-language maps of the airport to arriving Delta passengers, he added.

He also said that he has seen an increasing number of Latin Americans choose Atlanta over Miami or Houston as a connecting route to Asia or Europe and that his office has issued more gate passes than ever before to local officials, representing a surge in high-level international activity.

The office issued 80 passes in June, compared to the 15-20 per month it issued when it first opened in 2002, Mr. de Barros said.

Issuing gate passes to local consuls or Atlanta dignitaries, organizing escorts and security measures for high-ranking officials and acting as a point of contact at the airport, Mr. de Barros' office is helping Hartsfield-Jackson ingratiate itself with international decision-makers, he said.

“If we’re able to offer world-class services, if we’re able to do that in a friendlier more amenable way, more effective way, amen. That counts for a lot.”

In the adjoining video, Mr. de Barros discusses the origin of Hartsfield’s protocol office, recounts the arrival of former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl to Atlanta and extends an invitation to Atlanta-based officials to call him if they have a problem at the airport.

For more information, contact Mr. de Barros at Manuel.DeBarros@atlanta-airport.com.