Thanks to LANCELOT DIGITAL – Specific plans for Lanzarote as it is one of the islands most affected by the pandemic
The Plenary of the Parliament of the Canary Islands has unanimously approved this Wednesday [14] a Proposal No of Law (NLP) of the Socialist Parliamentary Group for the implementation by the Government of the Canary Islands of specific recovery plans for Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, with the object to face the effects of the Covid-19 crisis.
The proposal, defended by the socialist deputy Dolores Corujo, aims to consider the “special difficulties” that the eastern islands are going through, as a consequence of the tourist crisis caused by the restrictions on mobility imposed to face the Covid pandemic. -19.
The initiative considers “indisputable” the direct relationship between the fall in tourist activity and the collapse experienced by the economy, and highlights that the eastern islands have a “very high degree” of dependence on tourism, well above the average of Canarias, “which makes a differentiated treatment advisable”. A treatment that, in Corujo’s opinion, must include both specific lines of financing and direct actions by the Government of the Canary Islands.
In this sense, it is emphasized that the degree of tourist specialization of each of the islands is not homogeneous, since while in other islands agriculture, industry and services play a relevant role in their GDP, Lanzarote and Fuerteventura depend on almost exclusively from tourism, to the point where it is estimated that economic activity on both islands has fallen by more than 30%.
The socialist deputy said she was “convinced” therefore, that “we share the need to treat islands with unemployment figures that exceed the regional average by fifteen points, such as Fuerteventura or Lanzarote, whose unemployment figure is higher. twice the average for the Canary Islands ”.
For Corujo, facing from Lanzarote and Fuerteventura the “enormous” task that the economic reactivation will entail “will not be easy. The mere existence of recovery plans at European, Spanish and Canary Islands is not a sufficient condition to guarantee the arrival of the different funds to the extent that the economy of these two islands needs it. In addition to the existence of programs to attend, it is required the real capacity to execute them both by level of competence and by administrative capacity ”.
He also stated that Lanzarote and Fuerteventura have contributed “for years and years” to the common coffers “much more than they have received, and it was just that it was so, because we enjoyed a booming economy, we were the islands with the highest population growth and of greater social and economic dynamism. Today we are the hardest hit islands. Today we need the outstretched hand of the territories and the people with whom we share this common project called the Canary Islands ”.
“At a time when island and local administrations are overloaded, the collaboration of the Government in the execution of projects aimed at economic recovery is essential, because it is the only way to guarantee that forecasts become realities,” he explained. the socialist deputy.
