SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE/MADRID, 19 Apr. (EUROPE PRESS) –
Affiliates in hospitality, travel agencies and tour operators grew by 20.4% in March in the Canary Islands, compared to the same month of the previous year, to a total of 146,637 –24,832 more–, according to Turespaña data made public this Tuesday.
The Canary Islands accumulate 9% of the country’s affiliates, with 129,025 wage earners and 17,612 self-employed.
In Spain, employment in the tourism sector touched the pre-pandemic level in March, with 2.3 million Social Security affiliates, representing 99.4% of the registrations in the sector in the same month of 2019.
Salaried employment in tourism grew by 20.3% and self-employment by 1.8%.
In March, the trend of year-on-year increase in the number of affiliates in tourism that began in June last year continued. Affiliates in tourist activities accounted for 12.1% of the total number of affiliates in the national economy.
Total affiliates in the Spanish economy as a whole grew by 5.2% year-on-year, while in the services sector it increased by 6.1%. Last month, Social Security affiliates registered for work increased, in absolute variation, by 970,651 people.
The Minister of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, Reyes Maroto, assured that the “vigorous” recovery of tourism that is taking place in Spain is having a first “direct and immediate” impact on employment in our country.
“Even before Easter, which has been extraordinary, enrollment in the sector was at pre-pandemic levels in March and nearly 330,000 jobs have been created in tourism activities in the last year, which confirms the good times that tourism lives”, explained the minister.
In his opinion, the recovery has been very fast considering that in the previous financial crisis tourism employment took more than six years to recover, and he pointed out that they are currently touching “pre-pandemic levels just two years after the worst crisis that has faced the sector throughout its history”.
The minister attributed these favorable data “to the protection shield for workers and companies deployed by the Government and to the successful vaccination process.”
GOOD DATA IN ALL BRANCHES
In March, affiliates linked to tourist activities increased year-on-year in absolute terms by 329,215 workers in labor registration, which represents an increase of 16% year-on-year, according to data from Turespaña.
The variation in affiliates was positive in all tourism branches: the hotel industry increased by 241,724 affiliates (165,301 in food and beverage services and 476,423 in accommodation services); the other tourist activities increased by 85,135 affiliates, while in travel agencies there was a rise of 2,356 workers.
Last month, the number of employees in the tourism sector, which represents 79.7% of the total number of affiliated workers in said sector, increased by 20.3% compared to the same month of the previous year.
By branches of activity, salaried employment increased in travel agencies and tour operators (4.2%) and in hospitality (23.7%), and within this it increased by 20.1% in services
food and beverages and 38.3% in accommodation services.
Self-employment in tourism, which represents 20.3% of the total number of affiliated workers, increased by 1.8%. The hospitality industry shows an increase of 0.9%.
Specifically, in food and beverage services it grew by 0.6%, while in accommodation services it increased by 4.8%. In travel agencies, there was an interannual increase of 4.7% in the number of self-employed.
In the hotel industry and travel agencies/tour operators together, sectors that represent 68% of the total number of registered labor affiliates to the Social Security in tourism, the affiliates increased by 17.7% in the interannual rate. This increase was due to both the increase in wage earners (23%) and the self-employed (1%).
INCREASE IN ALL COMMUNITIES
In the month of March, employment in the hotel industry and travel agencies/tour operators as a whole increased in all
autonomous communities.
In absolute figures, the greatest increases in variation occurred in Andalusia, the Valencian Community, the Balearic Islands, Catalonia, the Canary Islands and the Community of Madrid.
In relative terms, the interannual increases in the Balearic Islands (61.4%), Andalusia (22.9%), the Valencian Community (20.9%) and the Canary Islands (20.4%) stand out.
The Valencian Community, Andalusia and the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla already exceed the absolute number of affiliates in hotels and travel agencies and tour operators in March 2019.
In the case of the Valencian Community, it closed March with 180,151
registrations in the aforementioned subsectors (+1,309 registrations than in 2019); Andalusia, with 279,483 (+381 more) and Ceuta and Melilla together, with 3,783 (+48).
