Ever upward: May’s tourism in Mallorca and the Balearics

If one feels this rise may have reflected a lingering Covid effect last year, well it was up by 96,420 compared with 2019, a 5.67% increase. And which were the markets leading the way? Germany with 31.3% (563,000) and the UK with 29% (521,000), both higher than last year (542,000 and 480,000 respectively). By comparison with 2019, the German market rose by over 30,000, while the UK market was down by 17,000. Crucially, though, it is 2022 with which the most significant comparison lies, and that is because both German and UK tourism declined for the whole of last year from the figures in 2019. The tourism recovery is therefore well and truly being realised, as the figures for January to May emphasise. Because Covid was a factor at the start of 2022, the better comparison is with 2019 - 176,000 more foreign tourists this year, an increase of five per cent.

I’d like to just draw attention to a comment related to the latest apparent indignation of Britons having to queue at passport control, as if this is actually anything new or indeed to do with Brexit. This comment went - “I am told visitor figures are down 20% this year for all the hype being spread.” So, are figures produced by Spain’s National Statistics Institute (INE) each month all hype? It is the institute which releases the Frontur and Egatur reports for tourist movement and spending. I understand there are those who will always dismiss statistics, but these are the best indications you can get, and Spain’s methodologies are rigorous. They must be, and the Bank of Spain ensures that they are, especially when it comes to spending. There is rigour, and what the stats show is that far from being 20% down, the figures are ten per cent up. There seems to me to be an obsessive desire to see Mallorca and the Balearics fail and to blame whatever most suits one’s own narrative, be this Brexit, prices, government attitude, cost-of-living crisis, tourist tax (select as applicable). I’m not saying that the buoyant figures as recorded up to May will definitely continue, but what matters, as they are the only true objective guide we have, are the numbers once they have been recorded; not forecasts in advance; not weekly bookings’ fluctuations as highlighted by analysts, because there always are fluctuations; not what someone has told so-and-so.

For the whole of Spain, the 29.2 million foreign tourists between January and May were just 0.4% below the total in 2019 (which was a record year for tourism in Spain). This led the Spanish tourism minister, Héctor Gómez, to observe: “We are experiencing the first days of a summer that will be historic for tourism in our country. Today’s data (those from the INE) for travellers and spending follow the extraordinary path of recent months - quality and competitiveness to continue being world leaders.”

You might think that he would say that. Fair enough, but what he was drawing attention to was the fact that other regions of Spain are making a comeback. Last year, there were 71.6 million tourists, down from the 83.7 million in 2019. The only region that all but matched 2019 was the Balearics, which repeatedly had 25% (or more) of all monthly tourist arrivals. The Balearic percentage in May was 21.9%, and that was because other regions have revived. It was a percentage that was still the highest in the country, just above Catalonia (21.8%), which has historically attracted more foreign tourists than any other region.

Héctor Gómez, it might be noted, is a PSOE minister, just as Iago Negueruela was a PSOE tourism minister in the Balearics, one who has bequeathed the strong tourism numbers to his Partido Popular successor. The PP, as the hoteliers noted after Marga Prohens’ investiture speech on Monday, are stressing the importance of tourism. Is Gómez not stressing this nationally? Did Negueruela not stress it?

Yes, the PP are eliminating talk of a decrease in tourist numbers, but they should be careful in not adding more and risking even more of a societal backlash against “saturation” than was the case under Negueruela or indeed Biel Barceló.

For now, though, there can be no denying the importance of tourism to Negueruela - more tourists than ever, spending more money than ever. The Egatur report for tourist spending pointed to a global increase for the whole of Spain of 15.8% compared with the first five months of 2019. Inflation has obviously influenced this, but people are paying higher prices.

As a footnote to the May figures, let me just mention tourism that is frequently overlooked because of all the attention paid to the resorts (certain ones in particular). The INE points out that the Balearics was the preferred destination for rural tourism. There were almost 172,000 overnight stays at the likes of agrotourism establishments, eleven per cent more than 2022. Occupancy of 52.7% couldn’t match that of resort hotels (up to around 70% on average), but it is a reminder that there is tourism which isn’t solely beach tourism, and Mallorca had 83% of those overnight stays.