As of: April 8, 2024, 5:05 a.m
By: Kai Hartwig
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Cheap tourists often have a reputation for spending their holidays in a cheerful and loud manner. Locals on Tenerife are now taking drastic measures.
Munich – Spain has been one of the most popular holiday destinations for German tourists for many years. The islands of this southern European country in particular attract holidaymakers from Germany. Whether the Balearic Islands with Mallorca and Ibiza or the Canary Islands with Tenerife, Gran Canaria, Fuerteventura or Lanzarote - the number of possible travel destinations is large.
However, many cheap tourists also flock to the Spanish holiday islands - especially to Mallorca. There have been initiatives there for some time to keep cheap tourists away from the Spanish island. Now Tenerife is also declaring war on cheap tourists.
Holiday island in Spain doesn't like cheap tourists: locals on Tenerife annoyed
Locals are not happy with developments on their home island. And are calling for a move away from mass tourism on Tenerife, which also attracts budget holidaymakers. “I don’t feel well anymore,” Vicky Colomer complained to the British
Daily Mail.
“It's like everything is designed for British and German tourists who just want to drink cheap beer, lie in the sun and eat burgers and fries,” said the 63-year-old Spanish woman, who lives in Tenerife.
Year after year, many tourists are drawn to Tenerife - including German holidaymakers. Some residents of the Spanish island want to put an end to mass tourism. © Imago
Tenerife was once “a paradise”. “Now it’s no longer that – and that makes me angry,” the 63-year-old told the British newspaper. She would rather have “higher quality tourists who really want to experience our culture and our food and respect our nature” in Tenerife. Forest fires caused significant damage on the island in 2023.
Locals want to drive cheap holidaymakers away from the island – “Tourists, get away!”
Locals keep starting protests on Tenerife to get rid of the unpopular cheap tourists. Graffiti and posters on house walls also show the islanders' dissatisfaction. “Tourists, get away!” and similar unambiguous messages to holidaymakers can be read in many places.
Ivan Cerdeña Molina is also based in Tenerife and is involved in the group ATAN (Asociación Tinerfeña de Amigos de la Naturaleza) - the association of nature lovers in Tenerife. This wants to end mass tourism on the island. On its official Facebook account, the group wrote in a post from March 21st: “Citizens are fed up with the ecological and social collapse on the Canary Islands and are mobilizing.”
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Activists denounce poverty rate on Spanish holiday island – “Locals are left homeless”
The article also contains a video: It shows ATAN activists with posters, the content of which is thought-provoking. According to the first poster, “1200 new residents per month” are arriving in Tenerife, “locals are left homeless,” it continues. “16 million tourists per year, second highest poverty rate in all of Spain” is written on another. “Average salary 1300 euros per month, average rent 1000 euros per month” on the next.
In addition, two posters denounce water wastage on Tenerife - especially by tourists. On average, a local resident uses 150 liters per day, while a tourist consumes an average of 600 liters per day. In order to make arriving tourists aware of this, the activists also posted their posters at one of the airports on Tenerife.
Numerous holiday accommodations for tourists – “Like a cancer that is eating the island bit by bit”
ATAN activist Cerdeña Molina confirmed in an interview with the
Daily Mail
that there has long been “a crisis” in Tenerife. The locals “live in their cars and even in caves,” he warned. The 36-year-old chose drastic words to describe the tourism problem in Tenerife. Holiday portals for holiday accommodation such as Airbnb or Booking.com are “like a cancer that is eating the island bit by bit,” said the Spaniard.
Social organizations have also seen mass tourism as a problem for a long time now. “We have been sounding the alarm for years about the problems of access to housing and homelessness in Tenerife, especially in the south,” José Antonio Díez Dávila, coordinator of the mobile street support units (UMAC) at Caritas Diocesana de Tenerife, told
Canarian at the end of 2023
Weekly
.
Income from vacationers gave Tenerife a record year in 2023 with billions in sales
Current figures show that tourism is fundamentally economically important for Tenerife. The year 2023 brought the Canary Islands a record year. As Jessica de León, councilor for tourism and employment in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, announced at the beginning of 2024, there were around 16 million tourists in the Canary Islands in 2023. Sales amounted to 20 billion euros, reported the Canary Islands news portal
danews.eu
. This also boosted the job market in the tourism industry; on the Canary Islands the proportion of employees increased by six percent.
Can a move away from cheap tourism and a switch to fewer, but significantly higher quality (also in terms of price) tourism offerings keep economic success at this level? Only the future can provide the answer. Many restaurateurs on Mallorca want things to go in this direction. If this were to be implemented, actions such as the beer record set by a German football team at Ballermann would probably be a thing of the past.
(kh)