The Diplomat
International tourism in Spain increased by 54% in 2021 compared to the previous year, when the arrival of travelers suffered a historic debacle due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to data published yesterday by the National Statistics Institute (INE).
More than 3.3 million tourists visited Spain in November 2021, seven times more than in November last year and 72% of the visitors in November 2019. Apart from that, the cumulative figure for the first eleven months of the year was 28.2 million tourists, an increase of 54% over the 18.33 million in the same period of 2020.
Spending between January-November increased by 63.8% to 31,274 million euros. Apart from that, tourists who visited Spain in November stayed on average one day longer than in 2019, which also increased average spending per tourist to €1,119, compared to €1,086 in November 2019.
The United Kingdom was the main outbound market in November, with 597,458 tourists, (17.8% of the total), followed by France, with 496,579 tourists, and Germany, with 479,403. The main sending countries in the first eleven months of 2021 were France (with nearly 5.3 million tourists and an increase of 42.0% over the same period of 2020), Germany (with nearly 4.8 million, and an increase of 107.5%) and the United Kingdom (with nearly 3.9 million tourists, up 27.6%).
Apart from this, the main destination of foreign visitors in November was the Canary Islands (with one million foreign visitors, three out of every ten tourists, mainly British and German), followed by Catalonia, with 604,925 tourists coming mostly from France and other European countries. Andalusia was the third community, with 485,504, mainly from the United Kingdom and Nordic countries. In the accumulated for the first eleven months of 2021, the communities that received the most tourists were the Balearic Islands (with more than 6.2 million and an increase of 265.4% over the same period of 2020), Catalonia (with almost 5.2 million and an increase of 37.6%) and the Canary Islands (with almost 4.4 million, up 21.7%).
These data “confirm that the recovery of international tourism continued its gradual advance in November, despite the increase in contagions in our main European markets,” said the Minister of Industry, Trade and Tourism, Reyes Maroto.
“Month after month we see how Spain is approaching the volumes of tourists and spending it had in 2019, although the uncertainty associated with the new wave could delay the recovery of pre-pandemic levels in international tourism, which will depend on its duration as we have seen in previous waves,” she continued. “However, confidence in travel to Spain is higher due to the high levels of vaccination in our country, which makes us foresee total international tourist arrivals in the fourth quarter of 2021 between 10.2 and 10.6 million, which is between 62% and 64% of those received in the same period of 2019,” she concluded.
