Adding to the scores of stories attesting to Portugal never having had it so good is the news that tourists last year ploughed an average of €41.5 million every day into the country’s economy.
Says financial website Dinheiro Vivo, the Bank of Portugal has confirmed that 2017 was the “best year” since records began, in all seeing €15.1 billion lavished on holidays and trips of all shapes and sizes.
But there is to be no resting on any laurels, according to the president of the committee organising upcoming initiative Summit Shopping Tourism and Economy 2018.
Says João Vasconcelos (not the left wing MP, but the former secretary of state for industry forced to resign following the football freebie scandal (click here): “Commerce could become the largest tourist expense in holidays. And this could influence many things. The day we perceive that they can spend more shopping than they do at a hotel, everything changes: the manner in which we promote ourselves, who we promote ourselves to, the way we communicate the country, inside cities.”
Vasconcelos then reeled off a slew of positive statistics, telling DV that North American, Chinese and Brazilian tourists are the ones that “spend most when they are travelling”.
“It’s time (for Portugal) to make the leap” to embrace these big spenders, he said. Consultants Global Blue have recorded, for example, that 2017 saw Portugal become the European country registering the largest growth in tax-free shopping.
“Non-EU holidaymakers spent more in a day, he added, than EU tourists spend in a week “and the numbers are growing”.
“Chinese tourists spend an average of €642 per day” and have zoomed to first place on the big spenders’ “podium”, said DV.
Behind them come the Americans (spending an average €506 per day), followed by Angolans (€252).
Shopping Tourism & Economy Lisbon 2018 will be blowing the trumpet about all this potential for the country on March 16, supported by ‘members of the government and representatives of public and private companies”.
As Vasconcelos explains, the country is “facing a dilemma”.
It is not enough to simply attract more tourists to the country, he told DV, efforts now have to focus on “increasing the profit from each tourist” – and to this end, his belief is that ‘commerce and gastronomy’ will do the trick.
If London and Paris can become ‘shopping destinations’, so too can Portugal, was his overriding message which also stressed the fact that as there are logistical constraints on numbers arriving via Lisbon airport “we have to understand how with those tourists we can achieve the highest return”.
It was only at the end of this rising crescendo of enthusiasm that DV agrees Vasconcelos admitted that the future cannot be “just about bringing in money” and that “it is necessary to qualify resources”.
natasha.donn@algarveresident.com
