The question we all ask ourselves in the tourism sector is: when will normalcy return?
And, for us, normalcy means open hotels, free movement of people, and, above all, resumption of international travel.
The end of the pandemic is near. The numbers of infections and hospital admissions are still high, but vaccination campaigns allow us to glimpse a world without fear of Covid-19.
However, our sector will only work at the end of the whole process: when citizens consider that the risks of the pandemic have disappeared and the authorities reopen the borders. And this process seems slow to us, especially when it is difficult to know when the authorities around the world will consider that there is no longer covid-risk.
In any case, once this moment arrives, I am optimistic about the recovery of our industry; and I am optimistic for the following reasons:
- People have a huge desire to live and escape
- Despite the fact that many businesses have not survived and that many people are having a hard time, statistics indicate that the population has money available well above the historical average
- Spanish destinations are perceived as safer from a health point of view than other more exotic ones
- The UK, Spain’s main customer, is vaccinating effectively, the British pound is on the rise, and concerns about a no-deal Brexit have faded.
But we have to keep in mind one last very important thing: summer holidays are from June to September, not in December. This year 2021 we cannot miss these months of good weather and school holidays. In Italy these days there is a strong controversy because, after the reopening of the ski resorts for February 15 was announced, the government rectified at the last moment, alleging the presence of the English variety of the virus. The Italian ski industry is outraged because they are aware that the good snow of February and March will no longer be in May. Let’s learn this lesson.
Agustí Codina – General Manager at MedPlaya Management Services
