On Thursday, the environment minister Miquel Mir, the director general for environmental education, Sebastià Sansò, and the director general for tourism, Rosana Morillo, visited one of these protected areas (the Tramuntana natural region) in order to highlight the information and monitoring campaign for places of environmental importance. This is being funded with 394,570 euros of tourist tax revenue.
The officers will advise people about regulations and their responsibilities and will also offer recommendations for enjoying the natural areas. Mir said that at a time of health crisis, being able to enjoy the natural environment is "more essential than ever".
Having environment information officers in areas which have experienced an increase in the number of visitors in recent months will enable the public to have first-hand information that will allow them to enjoy these areas with "clear responsibilities".
Morillo observed that the campaign "exemplifies the dual aspect of the sustainable tourism tax": social, in the form of recruiting 25 people, and the environment in terms of contributing to the conservation of protected natural areas.
As well as the Tramuntana, the protected natural areas are the Albufera Nature Park and Albufereta Nature Reserve, the Mondragó Nature Park, the Albufera des Grau Nature Park in Minorca, and the Ibiza and Formentera Ses Salines Nature Park. Twelve officers will be assigned to these and the other thirteen to LICs.
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And where exactly has the tourist tax revenue come from? We should warn these officers that their employment may be short term if the government is relying on last year's tourist tax revenues.
Seriously.. How divorced from reality is this circus? Never have I felt the need to vote so strongly till this current scenario exposed how badly we are being let down by incompetent government
Just scrap the tourist tax. No other destinations charge it. The majority of tourists regard it as an extra charge for no benefit.
I wonder why this money was not used to fix the leaking sewers which cause huge environmental damage? Plus, it might mean a few more tourists come back.
Speaking as someone who has contributed, not entirely willingly, to this not voluntary tax, I would have preferred for it to have subsidised the maintenance of areas of natural beauty and not jobs for friends of, I suspect, local politicians. For that I would prefer to subsidise jobs for unemployed Scotsmen or, at a pinch, Englishmen.