Sunday's tourism protest in Mallorca.

Sunday's tourism protest in Mallorca. | Majorca Daily Bulletin reporter

Humphrey CarterPalma17/06/2024 13:15
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Tourist bookings in the Balearics have grown by 14% in the last week compared to the same period last year, according to data from the TravelgateX platform, which puts the volume of bookings 23.37% higher than in 2022. Bookings have increased by 1.5% compared to the previous week in the Balearics, which accounts for 15.2% of bookings in Spain and is the third most popular region, behind Catalonia and Andalusia. In terms of how far in advance bookings were made, throughout Spain, 15.24% were made more than 90 days in advance, while 49.3% of bookings were made by couples. The average stay of travellers was 2-5 nights, representing 49.39% of bookings.

In terms of the nationalities that have made bookings to Spain, Spaniards lead with a 57.7% market share, followed by the British, despite the anti-mass tourism protests, and Thais. The increase in bookings from nationalities such as Italy, the United States and China also stand out. In the meantime, the central government delegate in the Balearics, Alfonso Rodríguez, today said that while he shares the sentiment and motivation of the protests against tourism overcrowding, he asked that they be communicated in advance to avoid situations such as those experienced this Sunday in Caló des Moro, where several people were stopped and checked by the Guardia Civil.

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Speaking to the media, Rodríguez explained that the Guardia Civil officers acted on their own initiative when they realised that a gathering was taking place in the enclave and that it had not been previously officially announced with government permission. However, according to Rodríguez, it is unlikely that the identification of these people will lead to a sanctioning process, because there was no incident, altercation, eviction or complaint. The Delegation is now awaiting the reports drawn up by the Guardia Civil officers.

“The situation we saw in Caló des Moro fits in with some of the complaints that are made to establish certain limits and to avoid overcrowding and with the policy of this Government Delegation”, argued Rodríguez, although he insisted that anyone who wants to demonstrate in the future, if they inform the Delegation beforehand, will not be prevented from doing so.

Alfonso Rodríguez reiterated that what happened this Sunday in Caló des Moro is a usual action of the Security Forces when there is a concentration or a concentration is interpreted that does not have permission. “With prior communication to this government delegation, which has the will to guarantee the right to demonstrate and which also shares many of the demands, all this would not have happened,” he concluded.