Airports and stadiums are behind schedule

They will come. But will Brazil build it?

THE 2014 football World Cup, to be held in Brazil, should provide an opportunity for the hosts to show what they can do, both on and off the pitch. Its footballers define o jogo bonito (“the beautiful game”), and these days the country’s economy is pretty good to watch as well. But it seems ever more possible that the country will drop the off-field ball. The 12 host cities have among them nine airport redevelopments which are well behind schedule. São Paulo has not even started to build the new stadium that is supposed to stage the opening match. In Rio de Janeiro the Maracanã stadium (pictured), pencilled in for the final, is a money-guzzling building site. The contract for Natal’s proposed arena was signed only on April 15th—more than three years after Brazil was named host.

Air travel is essential to shuttle fans between games, but most of Brazil’s airports are already operating above their nominal capacity. Baggage handling and check-in are slow; delays and cancellations common. On April 14th IPEA, a government-linked think-tank, said that even if all the planned airport upgrades were completed by kick-off (which it said would not happen), hectic growth in local demand would still leave most airports overcrowded—even without 1m football fans stopping by. The number of internal flights taken annually rose by 83m in 2003-10 and will rise by almost as much again by 2014, the study said.

IPEA’s warnings did not go down well with the government. Gilberto Carvalho, the secretary-general of the presidency, said they were “cobbled together from press clippings” and Brazilians, who suffered from an inferiority complex, were “betting on disgrace”. But it has long been obvious that the airports need radical change. Infraero, the sluggish state-owned monopoly that operates them, is so inefficient that for years it has failed to spend even half its budget for airport upgrades.

On April 26th came the long-awaited news that the government would turn to the private sector for help. Antônio Palocci, the chief of staff to the president, said concessions were being considered for five airports: first Brasília’s airport and two of São Paulo’s, and later one each of those in Belo Horizonte and Rio de Janeiro. But he gave no details of the terms on which the private consortia will operate, or how closely they will have to work with Infraero. Only three of the five airports he mentioned are on IPEA’s critical list.

Private-sector investment is very welcome, says Paulo Resende, an infrastructure specialist at the Fundação Dom Cabral, a business school. But just as important for the World Cup is realism about what is possible by 2014. New terminals, runways, technology and even entire new airports are needed to satisfy domestic demand, he says. “But if we persist in saying that everything will be ready for the World Cup, no matter what, we risk making fools of ourselves,” he says.

Mr Resende thinks that the tournament will need quick fixes, such as temporary check-in desks and waiting areas in airport car parks, and pressing smaller airfields into service. According to Respicio Espirito Santo, an aviation consultant, airlines will probably find seats for foreign football fans by suppressing domestic demand with big fare rises. Both worry that the government’s plan to speed things up by relaxing normally strict rules on building and managing publicly funded projects will lead to rampant cost escalation, as happened with the facilities for the Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro in 2007. Brazil may still be ready for kick-off, though perhaps with fewer stadiums than it had originally planned. But it looks likely to pay a high price for a successful tournament.