Holiday bookings to the top Balearic tourist archipelago have fallen by 4.3% over the past week compared to the previous week, new data reveals.
This decline comes after continuing concerns about new tourism taxes and overtourism following the introduction of a biometric data collection law called “Big Brother” in December.
With these fresh changes, tourists should expect higher costs and more paperwork to enter the country in Southern European.
The archipelago emerged as Spain's fourth most popular destination during the period, according to data published by booking platform TravelGatex.
This came behind Andalusia (19.7%), Catalonia (16.8%) and the Canary Islands (14.9%).
However, although bookings for the past week have collapsed, this period shows an increase of 19.8% compared to the same period last year. This suggests that the concerns shared by anti-mass tourism advocates remain a common issue.
The majority of reservations (33.6%) were made 90 days prior, while 10.5% were so-called “last-minute reservations” made before or the day before a trip. Meanwhile, 12.5% were booked between 11.7% from 31 to 60 days ago and 2 to 3 months ago.
Spanish citizens are the major nationals reserved through Travelgatex, followed by British tourists (20.6%), Germans (4%) and North America (3.8%).
Of the bookings made over the past seven days in Spain, 22.9% were for solo travel, and over half (50.9%) were made by couples.
This news of the recession over the past week has emerged as a major anti-mass tourism movement that organized several demonstrations of tourist overcrowding presence in Mallorca, which vowed to strengthen this year's action.
Menis Turism, Mez Vida (Tourism, More Life) platform, focusing on issues of housing, job safety and poverty, is its efforts in forecasting the continued growth of the upcoming tourism season. It is set to reorganize and double.
The move has “has worsened after seeing the Balearic government's new tourism campaign, announcing a billion dollar investment, property speculation and a boom in luxury tourism.”
The platform was behind a major protest in Parma during last year's holiday season, with an impressive 111 groups participating.
The island's rise in holiday rentals and hotels has been appointed as one of the leading causes of the housing crisis, with mortgages and rents being far too high for locals to afford.
