Hereu advocates moving towards a sustainable tourism model that puts people at the heart of tourism at the G20 Tourism Ministerial Meeting

The Minister for Industry and Tourism, Jordi Hereu, attends the G20 Tourism Ministerial Meeting

Spain attended this Summit held this Friday and Saturday in the Brazilian city of Belèm, as a guest country and as one of the leaders of the tourism sector at the international level. "Spain has a leading position in tourism at the international level, and we are working to lead the transformation of the model to ensure its sustainability", asserted Hereu during his speech at the forum.

At the G20 meeting, which revolved around the motto 'Building a just world and a sustainable planet', Spain - the second most visited country in the world after France - raised the important social contribution of tourism and its fundamental role in the creating quality employment and generating wealth for all citizens, as well as its contribution to conserving the environment.

Group photo of the G20 Tourism Ministerial Meeting

In this sense, Minister Hereu shared with the rest of the delegations Spain's progress in terms of employment and public policies aimed at strengthening the so-called triple sustainability: economic, social and environmental. "Tourism is key for social cohesion, and it is essential to invest in training and quality of employment", stressed the Minister, who reiterated that Spain has allocated 10 million euros to the Social Sustainability Plans, which include measures in the field of gender equality, functional diversity, training and professional development of workers, and another 59 million euros for the Digital Skills Plan, which improves the training of professionals.

According to the latest available data, tourism employment in Spain grew by 5.5% in August and added more than 151,000 new individuals registered in the Social Security system compared to a year ago, reaching a total of 2,910,948 workers employed in the sector. Moreover, 21.7% of those employed in the sector are foreigners, well above the average for the Spanish labour market, and in the hotel and catering sector, a key sub-sector within tourism, 53.5% of those employed are women.

Commitment to the challenges of tourism

In addition to taking part in the G20 meeting with his counterparts, the Minister for Industry and Tourism held bilateral meetings with representatives of relevant markets for Spain's tourism industry, such as Germany, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Portugal, India and the host country, Brazil. Hereu conveyed to the delegations of these countries the need to address the challenges of tourism, such as the overcrowding of some destinations, regulating and controlling tourist rental housing, preserving historical and cultural heritage, geopolitical threats and the challenges associated with climate change.

Within the framework of the summit, Hereu also participated in round tables and debates organised by UN Tourism and the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), in which he shared experiences and points of view on the multilateral challenges facing tourism and the need for cooperation between countries and also between public and private administrations. Hereu stressed the importance of "governing tourism, which means acting on its undesired effects, transforming conditions with effective policies that are committed to society".

The Minister for Industry and Tourism, Jordi Hereu, during his participation in the meeting of G20 Tourism Ministerial Meeting

Exporting a successful model

In recent years, Spain has equipped itself with a package of tools to monitor, support and transform the tourism sector. In the words of Jordi Hereu, these are "ambitious and effective measures to lay the foundations for leadership in the coming decades". It is worth reiterating, as the Minister pointed out during the summit, the "historic investment" of 3.4 billion euros from 2021, with the boost from the Next Generation EU funds, which are making it possible to modernise and improve the quality of tourism offerings.

Another example of the public promotion of tourism that Spain has shared with its partners in the G20 is the launch of the Network of Smart Tourist Destinations promoted by the Secretary of State for Tourism and managed by the Spanish State Society for the Management of Innovation and Tourism Technologies (SEGITTUR). This is a programme, which has already been exported to third countries, and which includes Latin American cities such as Montevideo, Bogota and Medellin in the network, aimed at improving the competitiveness of tourist destinations and citizens' quality of life by focusing on five key areas of action: governance, innovation, technology, sustainability and accessibility.

Holding of CONESTUR

Jordi Hereu also took advantage of the meeting in Belèm to inform those present that, on 9 October, there will be a new meeting of CONESTUR, the forum for dialogue between the public and private sectors whose aim is to advance the roadmap for tourism in Spain, in which the results of the participatory process carried out for developing the Sustainable Tourism Strategy 2030 will be presented.

This is a roadmap that Spain shares with its European Union partners, following UN guidelines and which, as Minister Hereu pointed out, has been nourished in Brazil by the contributions and debates that have arisen at the summit. "We must move in the right direction, and this requires the involvement of all stakeholders in the value chain, both private and public, and all levels of government, from local to multilateral," the Minister concluded.

Non official translation