At the G20, Spain defends the use of mobility certificates to restart safe international travel

The G20 is committed to supporting, complementing and coordinating these international initiatives in which Spain is an active participant. As the minister explained, "it is a priority for Spain to guarantee safe mobility to restore confidence in travelling and reactivate international tourism and the Spanish economy in general".

During the meeting, the guidelines developed for the G20 by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) - based on seven policy areas - to back tourism recovery were presented: safe mobility; crisis management; resilience; inclusiveness; green transformation; digital transition; and investment and infrastructure.

The work of the G20 will also focus on the green transformation of the tourism industry and the need to support global tourism in its move towards sustainability.

In this regard, the Minister for Tourism recalled that another priority of the Spanish government is to implement the Plan for the Transformation and Modernisation of the Tourism Sector, which will mobilise 3.4 billion euros in public investment over the next three years, financed by NextGenerationEU.

"Our objective is to maintain Spain's leadership in world tourism and, together with the reactivation of the sector, we will bring about the necessary transformations to modernise our tourism model, with pillars based on sustainability, quality, security and digitalisation as a roadmap", explained Maroto.

One of the fundamental and key elements to the Plan is sustainability, which is addressed through investment in tourist destinations as a priority using the Tourism Sustainability Plans. Another priority is the digitisation of tourism destinations and companies to give them easier access to more and more digitised and connected markets and tourists.

In the last two years, Spain has accumulated extensive experience in tourism intelligence and has developed a network of smart destinations.

The minister ended with a message of hope for the future of the travel and tourism sector, a "hope for the progress of vaccination around the world, which we hope will accelerate. Hope because we are going to have to have tools to promote safe international mobility and we are going to tackle a profound transformation of the tourism sector to ensure its future, which will be sustainable, quality-based, digital and safe."

Non official translation