Spanish tourist cities embrace collectivism to overcome crisis

Seville is hosting the First Convention of Tourist Destinations in the country

From 4 to 6 October this year, Seville is playing host to the First Convention of Tourist Destinations in Spain at the Congress and Exhibitions Palace (FIBES). With an estimated attendance of 300 people - representing mostly state, regional and local authorities in the field of tourism, it is the first time that an event of these characteristics has been convened in the Iberian country.

The Andalusian capital is also the co-organizer of the grand scale event, the other one being the national Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, through its Turespaña analytical industry institute. Such a conference was deemed necessary in the wake of the COVID pandemic, which grounded tourism activities in a sudden halt and jumbled up expectations.

Time for massive public-private collaboration

The convention aims to create a space for collective reflection, meeting, collaboration and planning between Turespaña, and its Tourism Councils abroad, and Spanish tourist destinations in order to disseminate and exchange good practices in the sector. Everyone working in it is of the opinion that there is a need to reinforce collaboration mechanisms for the planning of tourism policies and to get to know the trends or initiatives evolving in the private tourism sector.

The convention is structured around the core ideas of sustainability and digitization, which will be studied in the different presentations, round tables and interviews. Finally, there will be bilateral meetings between tourist destinations and the tourism emissaries that Turespaña has in the main international markets. The result sought will be the preparation of tourism marketing activities for 2022.

Seville’s mayor Juan Espadas, spoke at the inauguration appealing for unity between the public and private institutions that looks above and beyond political differences and concentrates on the prisms of sustainability, innovation and digitization.

He concluded so: “Unity was key to achieving record indicators in 2019, before the pandemic, in the whole of Spain, Andalusia and Seville. From Andalusia and Seville, we have maintained an alliance with the Government of Spain that has allowed us to achieve previously unattainable goals in matters of international promotion, holding large events and record numbers in activity. This same unity must prevail in this re-start that involves recovery”.

He also pointed as an example last week’s creation of a Local Tourism Council in the city. In this body, along with traditional tourism agents, residents are also represented, since recovery and growth cannot be at the cost of putting pressure on residents.