Palma. Egatur, a Central Government organisation monitoring the trends in tourism throughout Spain, reported yesterday that the drop was the direct result of less visitors coming to Spain last month and the less time they spent on average in the country.
Although there was a drop of 1.7 percent in the number of tourists coming to Spain last month in comparison with April 2011, Egatur was able to confirm that the accumulated tourist spend for the first four months of the year continues to remain in positive figures. It rose by 3.5 percent compared to the same period in 2011 to top the 13'000 million euro mark.
From January to April this year, the average daily tourist spend was 108 euros and the amount that foreign visitors spent during the whole of their trip was up by 2.3 percent to an average of 951 euros.
Even in April, the average daily spend was up by 12.9 euros in comparison with the same month in 2011 but the amount individually spent by tourists over the entirety of their stay dropped by 2.6 percent to 884 euros.
Big spenders
During the first four months of this year, the biggest spenders in Spain were German visitors who increased their year-on-year spend by 0.8% to register 2'212 million euros, followed closely by the British with 2'195 million (4.1% less than during the first four months of 2011); Scandinavia with 1'630 million (+4.3%); and the French, 1'121 million (-5.4%).
The Canary Islands was the region where most was spent by foreign visitors from January to the end of April this year, 3'818 millionn euros. The figure accounted for 29.4 percent of the total tourist spend in Spain for the period, and was a 1.3 percent increase in comparison with the same period in 2011.
Catalonia was in second place with 2'767 million euros, 15.3 percent more than over the first four months of 2011.
In April alone, Catalonia was the region which benefited most from the increase in spending by German and French tourists - up 11.3% in comparison with April 2011 to 947 million euros. In fact even in the Canary Islands, the April year-on-year spend fell by 14.3% to 770 million euros.
Andalucia was the region where foreign visitors spent the third highest amount but the total figure for the first four months of the year was down 8.4% in comparison with January to April in 2011 to settle at 1'952 million euros. The decline in numbers in Andalucia, said Egatur had been in evidence since the beginning of the year as a direct consequence of the arrival of fewer British visitors.
Spending in the region of Madrid in the same period totalled 1'426 million euros, 13 percent more than in the same period in 2011 and accounted for 11% of the total tourist spend by foreign visitors in the country. In April alone, an increase of 9.8% was registered, notably because on average, people were staying longer.
In the Balearics meanwhile, the tourist spend from January to April totalled 969 million euros, 0.9 percent less than the same period in 2011. This is a direct result of the 16.4 percent downturn in tourist spend in April this year.
In terms of accommodation favoured by foreign visitors during the first four months of this year, 63.3% stayed in hotels, a four percent increase in comparison with the same period in 2011. Egatur reported that 67.9% of spending by foreign visitors coming to Spain went on independently arranged travel.
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