Canarian President champions 3rd generation tourism s part of touristic modernization plans

[aspasia]

The Canarian President, Paulino Rivero, has championed his government's plans to continue towards a "third generation" of tourism to contribute to the transformation of the Canarian economy. Speaking in Parliament in response to a question about the plans for touristic moderization, Sr Rivero said that one of the biggest challenges facing the Canaries in the coming decade is to make its economic model more competitive, more productive, and more capable of generating employment.

He said that the government had therefore committed to a higher quality tourism that respected the environment, and that "innovative elements" were needed to commit to a territorial equilibrium which modernized the sector without using more land. Finally he defended the plans to strengthen the knowledge-based economy and to  boost the possibilities open to the Canaries in their geographical environment, particularly in West Africa, an extraordinary area of opportunities for Canarian businesses. JA

[aspasia]

Sr Rivero has repeated his message loud and clear in the Magma Centre, where he appeared yesterday in a local presentation of municipal plans for modernization and improvement of tourism in Adeje and Arona. Present were representatives from both councils and from the hotel and tourism sectors. Sr Rivero said that there was no other economic activity in the Canaries capable of creating employment en masse other than tourism, and for pure self-interest, the islands had to improve their competitivity against the likes of the Caribbean, Turkey and Morocco so as to take advantage of the fact that we have touristic factors here - like climate, natural features, etc. - to be the best in the world.

Referring specifically to the plans unrolled by Adeje and Arona, the President said that with the numbers of unsold apartments here, the construction industry wasn't going to return to the boom years, and that it would be helped by works intended primarily to help the tourism sector, in that jobs would be created by renovation and refurbishments in touristic areas.  Turning to the regional Government's own new Ley de Renovación y Cualificación Turística de Canarias, currently in procedural draft stage, and said that it included a range of non-economic incentives to create employment and underpin the sector, not least by obligatory refurbishments of hotels.

These plans had to work, the President said, emphasizing that the challenge of modernization has started and was unstoppable. He stressed: if it doesn't work, we may as well all emigrate.  JA