Tourism rises and unemployment falls in the Balearic Islands

The Balearic Islands have had record tourist seasons for five years, both in terms of arrivals and visitor spending. This 2017 continues with the trend, however, tourism is no longer growing only in summer, the Islands are going to record one of the best low seasons in history.

The Balearics received 269,838 international tourists up to February, an increase of 1% over the same period in 2016, according to the Border Tourism Movements Survey (FRONTUR). In the first two months of the year, the main issuing market for the Balearics was Germany, with 57.4% of tourists, and the United Kingdom, with 15.9%, but this is just the beginning of the increase.

This panorama of tourism growth is reflected in sectors such as employment. The Balearic Islands registered 48,294 unemployed in April, a figure that represents a decrease of 17.36% compared to the same month last year, with 10,147 fewer unemployed, and of 17.16% compared to March, with 10,001 fewer unemployed. The same has happened with foreigners in the Balearic Islands with 9,266 unemployed in April, 17.6% less than the same month last year and 21.93% less than in March.

Unemployment falls in the Balearic Islands

Contracts registered in the islands in April represent 14.27% more than in April 2016 and 22.5% more than last March. Permanent contracts 19.42% more than in April last year, and 9.62% more than in March. Temporary contracts were up 13.42% year-on-year and 25.07% month-on-month. In Spain as a whole, the number of unemployed registered in the public employment services fell in April to 3,573,036 people, the lowest figure since 2009, after experiencing the largest monthly decrease in the historical series, with 129,281 fewer unemployed.

If we look at it by economic sectors, unemployment fell in all of them, but mainly in services (96,672 people), followed by agriculture (11,330), construction (8,944) and industry (8,264), while in the group seeking their first job opportunity it fell by 4,071 people.As for the duration of the working day, of the total number of permanent contracts signed in April, 87,757 were full-time (16,292 less) and 46,111 were part-time (11,121 less), as well as 17,580 permanent discontinuous contracts (433 more). With respect to temporary contracts, 941,414 full-time temporary contracts were signed (75,787 fewer), and 511,614 part-time (25,530 fewer); while of the total number of temporary contracts, 8,893 were of a training nature (2,795 fewer).

With these figures, it is estimated that bookings for this summer 2017 will oscillate around 8%, a growth that is consolidated mainly for the Balearic Islands, then for Andalusia, Catalonia and the Canary Islands.

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