Tourism is the islands’ important financial driver, nevertheless it has additionally priced native individuals out of the property market and can also be damaging the surroundings.
Around 30,000 individuals took to the streets of the totally different cities and cities of the archipelago on Sunday underneath the slogan “The Canary Islands have a restrict”.
Over 16 million vacationers visited in 2023 and it’s probably that the quantity might be greater on the finish of 2024. Tourists spent greater than 20 billion euros in 2023, however this comes at a value.
And whereas protesters admit that tourism supplies essential jobs, they are saying most of them are low-skilled and poorly paid.
Because many properties are owned by second owners who do not reside there on a regular basis, shopping for a property to reside in has change into prohibitive — and renting an inexpensive house has lengthy been a wrestle.
Last 12 months tourism grew by 5% and protesters say that’s an excessive amount of, because the islands have change into overcrowded. Many counsel that the reply lies in attracting fewer, however richer, vacationers, as different international locations have efficiently completed.
It impacts biodiversity
Among the associations behind the newest protest was Ecologists in Action. It deplores the injury that mass tourism has induced to the fragile biodiversity of the Canary Islands, which due to its volcanic formation has protected areas, endemic species and distinctive ecosystems.
After the massive protest in April, demonstrators hoped that the islands’ parliament would go new laws, such because the introduction of a vacationer tax, which is already levied in Spain’s Balearic Islands which endure from related issues.
But in keeping with the protesters there have been no substantial legislative adjustments – nor any vacationer tax.
In Maspalomas, on the island of Gran Canaria, one of many protesters, Eugenio Reyes, instructed native media that “all the things stays the identical.”
“There has been no official contact nor has an observatory or area been created for civil society to take heed to residents who’ve concrete proposals,” he stated.
