The tourism phase started at the beginning of the twentieth century and increased
dramatically in the 1950s and 1960s, but was temporarily stopped after 1969. But in the
mid-1980s tourism was again promoted. It was difficult to stimulate the economy and
mitigate the consequences of the decline in the economy which came about as a
consequence of the decline of the international financial sector, the departure of Shell
and the takeover of the management of the refinery by the state-owned, Venezuelan
company, PDVSA (Curiel, 2005).