Madrid, Aug 9 (EFE).- Tourism employment in Spain increased by 5.4% in the second quarter compared to the same period in 2022, up to 2,864,776 employed (146,678 more), which represents a figure a 6.3% higher than that of 2019, according to data published this Wednesday by Turespaña.
The Minister of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, Héctor Gómez, has described these data as “extraordinary” and has stressed in an interview with RTVE that tourism “is pulling the country’s economy”.
In this way, one in four new jobs that have been created in Spain between April and June (589,000 more employed) is linked to tourism (24.9%), which together constitute 13.6% of total employment in the Spanish economy.
Gómez has defined as “magnificent” the evolution of the sector, which offers, he said, “job stability”.
According to Turespaña, the percentage of unemployed to active in tourism activities was 8.5% in the second quarter, which is half a percentage point higher than that of the same quarter of the previous year.
This organization explains it by the increase in the active population in the sector and with which they are concatenated, says the report, four consecutive quarters of increases in the interannual rate.
TRANSPORT GROWS AT 10.8%
The number of employed persons increased in all tourist activities in the second quarter, except in the section on other activities, which decreased by 0.8%.
In hospitality, the increase was 7.1%, due to the positive evolution of both food and beverage services (7.1% more) and accommodation services (7.2%).
Employment grew in travel agencies by 0.4%, while in passenger transport the rise stood at 10.8%.
Salaried employees (employees) in the sector in the analyzed period totaled 2,381,684 people (83.2% of total employed), 2.1% more than in the same quarter of 2022, while the The number of self-employed stood at 482,388 people, 6% less.
Regarding the type of contract, wage-earners in the tourism sector with an indefinite employment relationship (80.4%) increased by 18.1% in the second quarter, which represents the eighth consecutive increase in the interannual rate, while wage-earners with a temporary contract decreased by 19.9%.
In relation to the issuing markets, the head of Tourism has highlighted the “consolidation” of the European market and the “great growth” of spending at the destination.
Likewise, Héctor Gómez has mentioned air connectivity as one of the keys to the influx of tourists, especially in the Asian and American markets.
According to the data it has provided, the Asian and Chinese market has grown by more than 420% in the year compared to a year earlier, while the increase in the flow of American tourists has been estimated at around 60%.
CATALONIA, LEADER BY COMMUNITIES
By autonomous community, employment grew in Catalonia by 7.2% in the second quarter, with a number of employees in the tourism sector of 487,314 people, the highest of all the regions.
The highest interannual rate in the period occurred in Galicia, with a rise of 18.3% (130,061 workers), followed by the Balearic Islands (18.1% more and 202,157 employees).
By volume of employees in the sector, after Catalonia are Andalusia (454,304 people, 3.4% more in the second quarter) and Madrid (440,033 jobs, 3.7% more).
The number of employed persons decreased in the interannual rate in the second quarter only in the Valencian Community (4%), Castilla y León (10.9%), Aragón (3.4%) and Cantabria (1.1%).
In the economy as a whole, the number of employed persons evolved favorably in all the autonomous communities, except in the cities of Ceuta and Melilla.
The autonomous communities with the greatest number of tourist flows (Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Andalusia, the Valencian Community and Madrid) have, in turn, been the ones that have generated the most employed people in the sector: together, 74.5% of the total employed in the second quarter. EFE
at/prb
