Autor/a

Juan Antonio Duro Moreno

Coautor/es

Fco. Javier Farré Albendea (Universidad Rovira i Virgili)

Peter Domonkos

The main objective of the paper is to analyze whether climatic factors have affected tourism flows in Spain and its regions. To achieve this, there is first a presentation of a complete quantitative characterization of the potential climate of Spain (and its eight climatic regions), based on constructing homogeneous territorial data relating to temperature, rainfall, sunshine hours and wind, for the period from 1951 to 2011. The analysis highlights the favourable condition of these vectors prevalent in Spain with the exception of the increase in average temperature experienced during the period analyzed. Second, an analysis was made of the relationship between these increases and tourism results during the sub-period 1999-2011 in the identified Spanish regions for the main summer months (July and August), along with overnight stays in hotels. Typically, it appears that hotel nights generally increase in Spain and the increase is largest precisely in the hottest months of the year (July and August). Beach tourism is particularly popular, mainly for international visitors. Hot weather, consequently, does not seem to affect the increasing rate of summer tourism, but the indirect impacts of climate change might threaten the capacity for maintaining a continuously high level of service in all resorts.

Palabras clave: climate change, climatic extremes, climatic impacts, hotel nights, beach tourism, Spain, strategic planning