The president of the Cabildo, Pedro Martín, yesterday held a working meeting with some of the main tour operators in the national market prior to the International Tourism Fair (FITUR), “to advance the most important lines of Tenerife’s tourism strategy in this year, with which the island wants to strengthen its main issuing markets and also consolidate the figures of other emerging markets that have significant growth potential”, he explained.
Along these lines, Pedro Martín referred to the island’s good connectivity data, with 7.5 million air seats planned for this year, which is also accompanied by the consolidation of international flag carriers, such as British Airways, Lufthansa , Air France, Aer Lingus, Ukraine Airlines, Aeroflot or AirBaltic. Among them, he highlighted the new connection of United AIrlines, between Tenerife south and New York for this summer. “We are connected to 135 destinations in 31 markets through 55 airline groups, figures that place us as the first destination in the Canary Islands, with 36% of regional air traffic.”
The president pointed out that, in the absence of data for the month of December, the island received 4.2 million passengers last year, of which 1.2 million arrived from airports on the Peninsula, with which the share of domestic passengers to Tenerife was the largest in the archipelago, 40.5%.
Pedro Martín also presented the main investments in tourism infrastructure, such as those included in the Tenerife y el Mar program, which include various improvements to the coastline, as well as other relevant actions, such as the one carried out in the Barranco de Masca, the improvement and modernization of the network of tourist information offices, the Teide National Park Visitor Center, whose work will be completed shortly, or the improvement of other tourist spaces such as the rural parks of Teno and Anaga.
Participating in this meeting were the First Vice President and Insular Councilor of the Area of Roads, Mobility, Innovation and Culture of the Cabildo, Enrique Arriaga; the island director of Tourism, Laura Castro, and the CEO of Tenerife Tourism, David Pérez; in addition to the mayors of the municipalities of Puerto de la Cruz, Arona, Adeje and Santiago del Teide.
Among the main strategic lines for this year, the president detailed the actions linked to the declaration of Tenerife as the first smart tourist territory in Spain and the first Spanish tourist destination with an Artificial Intelligence Master Plan or the preparation of the Tenerife tourist cybersecurity master plan .
In terms of sustainability, Martín pointed out that “there are no future possibilities for a destination if it does not invest to be sustainable” and reviewed some of the actions that the island undertakes in this area. “Tenerife is a certified Biosphere destination, with 250 island companies already adhering to this methodology in 2021, a milestone that is much more than a certification and that forces us to constantly review and update our sustainability strategy,” he said.
In this sense, he referred to the agreement signed between the Cabildo and Acuaes, with a planned investment of 170 million euros for the correct sanitation and purification of wastewater on the island, the new Insular Waste Management Plan or the progress in the implementation of renewable energies- The president also recalled that the certification of El Teide and the summits of Tenerife as a Starlight Destination and Reserve has been renewed.
