In Madrid, 55 countries from five continents united to reactivate international tourism

Madrid’s international tourism fair, Fitur, was the last major trade fair of its kind to be celebrated before the pandemic, in January 2020. It is now the first major event in the sector to resume a face-to-face format in Europe. From May 19 to 23, Fitur plans to welcome 10,000 visitors to the Ifema exhibition center – the same which, during the first wave of the pandemic, had been transformed into a large field hospital for Covid-19 patients.

Now Spain, with an incidence rate of less than 150 cases per 100,000 inhabitants over fourteen days, has moved up the slope and is eagerly awaiting the approval of the European Green Certificate by the European Union – the health pass – to reactivate the tourism sector. The latter accounted for 13% of gross domestic product in 2019.

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If the outlook is far from the figures for 2020, when more than 11,000 companies from 165 countries and regions of the world and 150,000 professionals had made the trip, the Spanish government has bet big on an edition of Fitur whose slogan is “Tourism is Back” (“Tourism is back”). In order to facilitate the attendance of representatives from as many countries as possible, he gave the event a character of “public interest”, allowing it to easily grant foreign participants visas for the event.r “essential travel” and to allow participating Spanish companies to deduct their costs from their taxes.

Twenty-three security protocols

Nearly 5,000 companies from 55 countries on five continents, 50,000 professionals and 37 official international representations are expected. From Colombia to Russia, via Egypt, Italy, Mexico, Maldives, Tunisia or Turkey, the event wants to mark a big blow. To access the Ifema Palace, all accredited persons must provide a PCR test of less than 72 hours, or an antigen test if they are already in Spain. The gauge will be set at 50% and the wearing of a mask, of course, compulsory. Finally, professionals who have not made the trip will be able to connect to the new digital platform Fitur Live Connect.

On site, in a space dedicated to “safe mobility”, nearly twenty-three “anti-Covid” security protocols will be presented. And on Friday May 21, the application which must be put into operation in Spain once the European green digital certificate has been approved will be officially unveiled in the presence of the head of government, the Socialist Pedro Sanchez. “Spain is ready”, has insisted in recent days the Minister of Tourism, Reyes Maroto, who described Fitur as “Inflection point to reactivate the tourism sector”.

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