Madrid (EFE).- The president of the Canary Islands, Ángel Víctor Torres, celebrated this afternoon, at a conference on sustainable tourism organized by Cadena SER, in Madrid, the progress achieved by the archipelago in terms of sustainability, although he has urged “accelerate as quickly as possible” the transformation towards a tourism model that “will be sustainable or it will not be”.
Along with Torres, the second edition of Encuentros SER, which took place at the BBVA headquarters in the Spanish capital, was attended by the Minister for Industry, Commerce and Tourism, Reyes Maroto, and the President of the Cabildo de Gran Canaria, Antonio Morales, among other speakers.
In this ecological transition, energy from clean sources on the islands increased from 10% to 19% between 2018 and 2022, while in that period of time the Canary Islands multiplied by twenty -from 400 to 8,000- the number of photovoltaic installations of self-consumption in homes.
For the head of the regional executive, the “digital and sustainable” transformation by a new model “has no going back”, which is why he has urged the Canary Islands to strengthen its image in sustainability to go from being a “first level destination” to become a “green hub” for sustainable charging.
In fact, during his speech, he alluded to the “interest” of tour operators to promote flights that use sustainable fuels SAF -“sustainable aviation fuel”, for which the European Union proposes compensation for the extra cost to the airlines.
Likewise, the Canarian leader has assumed the commitments adopted at the Glasgow Climate Summit and has defended the approval of the Climate Change and Energy Transition Law, approved by the regional Parliament on December 13, as one of the “great milestones” of the legislature, a rule that provides for the decarbonization of the archipelago in the year 2040.
In addition, the “ambitious law” of the Canary Islands on climate change aims to reduce emissions in the region by 84.2% due to mobility, to increase renewable energies by up to 92% and for the mobile fleet to have a fleet with zero dioxide emissions. carbon.
Reyes Maroto: Canary Islands is the best space to design tourism policy
In the same forum, Minister Reyes Maroto stated that the Canary Islands represent the “best space” to “design the Government’s tourism policy” under the premise of sustainability.
Maroto has predicted that 2023 will confirm the “model change” in the consolidation of the Canary Islands and Spain as sustainable destinations, after a year in which the archipelago received 12.6 million foreign tourists and close to two million national visitors.
During her speech, the Minister of Tourism said that, at the end of 2022, the Government authorized 2,412 million euros of the 3,400 million with which the Recovery Plan for tourism is endowed, the “largest investment in history” , which allocated more than one hundred million euros to projects related to tourism sustainability.
It has also announced a national plan for sun and beach tourism, which will be presented in the coming weeks and will have an economic boost from Next Generation European funds to “modernize” Spain’s pioneering destinations in the sector.
“This plan is a recognition of the destinations that put us on the map and need an investment boost,” said Maroto, who hopes that the Canary Islands will be one of the beneficiaries of the “important resources” that the plan will mobilize. EFE
