Tourism in Spain: Trends and Development
Tourism in Spain
Tourism is an activity that implies the temporary displacement of residence for leisure objectives: tourists staying overnight in Spain, excluding hikers. The word “tourist” is an English term that defines a person who travels for pleasure or cultural reasons. In the nineteenth century, tourism was an activity enjoyed only by aristocrats. However, since the 1970s, it has become a mass phenomenon.
3.2 The New Alternative Tourism and Tourism Policy
Existing problems require a restructuring and renewal of tourism policy based on land management to coordinate the activities of the sectors involved. The updated tourism policy proposes the following objectives:
a) To promote quality tourism (high income): This involves creating robust infrastructure, upgrading facilities, improving vocational training, and caring for the environment.
b) Improving supply: To alleviate seasonality, regional imbalances, and competition from other countries, encouraging new forms of tourism, including:
- Senior tourism
- Nautical sports and golf tourism (attracting people with high purchasing power)
- Rural tourism (preventing rural depopulation)
- Ecotourism (highlighting natural areas like national parks)
- Urban tourism, cultural tourism, and congress/convention tourism (closely related to cuisine, culture, and recreation)
c) Reduce dependence on the external sector: This can be achieved through the creation of national tour operators.
d) Tourism development compatible with environmental quality: Today’s environmental awareness has grown, leading to studies on tourism’s environmental impact, promoting a positive tourist image, and preserving the life of the resident population.
4. Tourist Areas and Their Classification
Tourist areas are spaces that experience a large influx of tourists, both foreign and domestic. In Spain, the highest densities correspond to areas of sun and beach tourism, such as the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, and the Mediterranean coast. Madrid also receives a significant amount of cultural tourism.
In addition to these major tourist spots, there are isolated areas based on different attractions, such as skiing, rural tourism, and historic cities (Salamanca, Granada, etc.).
All these areas can be classified according to their use in the tourist season, such as Catalonia and the Balearic Islands (seasonal tourism), or stabilized tourism, as seen in the Canary Islands, Malaga, and Alicante.
4.1 Tourist Areas of Sun and Beach
The primary tourist areas of sun and sand are the Balearic and Canary Islands and the Mediterranean coast. They receive a significant influx of tourists drawn by their climate and beaches, but they differ in several aspects:
- Accessibility: Identifying gaps in tourist occupation. Some areas have benefited from having infrastructure, airports, and relative proximity to Europe (e.g., Catalonia), unlike other parts of the Mediterranean coast, which show gaps in tourist occupation.
- The occupation of the space model: In some cases, tourist accommodations are integrated into the existing urban structure, configuring extensions (e.g., Benidorm). In other cases, tourism generates new settlements with accommodations, sports facilities, and commercial areas (e.g., Marina Dor).
- The type, quality, and customer of the accommodations: The predominance of hotels or non-hotel accommodations, extensive low-density models versus high-density models, high-class or middle-low class accommodations, domestic or foreign customers, all differentiate tourist areas.
4.2 Other Tourist Areas
Since 1990, there has been a spatial spread of tourism due to several factors:
- Increased tourism generated by proximity to large urban areas, both inland and on the coast.
- Rural areas of the interior have embraced tourism as a development strategy and a means of economic diversification.
- The need to restructure traditional coastal areas has led to the incorporation of tourism into the littoral space.
- The desire for quality and new attractions by tourists.
Thus, other tourist areas have emerged based on different factors:
- Madrid: The capital, home to cultural tourism, conferences, and conventions.
- The Galician and Cantabrian coast: Offers unsaturated coastal and inland areas with rural and natural landscapes.
- Rural tourism centers: Intended to stimulate activity complementary to agriculture and restore local traditions. They include private accommodation and leisure activities.
- Ski resorts: Tourism based on snow, such as Sierra Nevada.
- Historical and artistic cities: Enable cultural tourism (museums and monuments), such as Salamanca and Toledo.