SPAIN: Controlling Tourism & more – 30th Jan 2025

Buenos días from Gracia! This is the Rorshok Spain Update from the 30th of January twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Spain.

Let’s begin this week with international news about a Spanish tourist ban.

On Tuesday, the 28th, Euro Weekly News said that while the government introduced new regulations to control tourism, they do not target any particular group specifically.

Notably, Málaga’s local government, located in southern Spain, has enacted a three-year ban on registering new holiday rentals in forty-three of its provinces. The ban will begin on the 22nd of February.

Also, all travelers booking accommodations or car rentals in Spain are required to provide more personal information, a rule that applies to both locals and tourists.

On Wednesday the 22nd, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, President Pedro Sánchez defended Spain’s defense spending after U.S. President Donald Trump criticized Madrid for not meeting NATO’s 2% GDP target. Sánchez noted a 70% increase in Spain’s defense budget over the past decade, making it NATO’s 10th largest contributor. Trump, who mistakenly referred to Spain as part of BRICS, proposed raising the NATO target to 5%, a move backed by Poland, Estonia, and Lithuania due to security concerns over Russia and its proximity, ensuring mutual support.

Also during the conference, Sánchez accused tech billionaires of undermining democracy through disinformation and divisive algorithms. He urged for stricter EU regulation, proposing digital IDs and a crackdown on fake profiles. In particular, he singled out Elon Musk for inciting hatred and supporting far-right ideologies on Twitter.

Moving toward Catalunya, the Spanish government has finally broken a legislative deadlock with the Catalan separatist party Junts, securing support for key economic measures.

President Sanchez confirmed the deal on Tuesday, the 28th. It includes pension increases, flood relief for Valencia, and a six-month extension of some public transport subsidies.

Junts, the Catalan nationalist and pro-independence party, has been excluded from some tax reforms, such as the windfall tax on energy firms as part of the negotiations.

The agreement also permits Junts to go ahead with its call for a vote of no confidence against Sanchez, which the president previously dismissed.

Keeping with legislation, Spain is set to legalize medical cannabis by summer twenty twenty-five, with a royal decree requesting legalization already submitted to the European Council.

The new law, approved initially in twenty twenty-one, permits tightly regulated cannabis-based products like oils but bans cannabis flowers and cultivation. Access will be limited to pharmacies, with prescriptions available for specific conditions, including multiple sclerosis, therapy-resistant epilepsy, and chemotherapy-induced nausea.

Critics argue the law is overly restrictive. Meanwhile, Spain's cannabis social clubs continue to operate in legal grey zones, exploiting a loophole that permits private, nonprofit cannabis use.

Spain is following the likes of Germany and Luxembourg towards cannabis reform, though recreational use remains prohibited.

Next up, according to media outlet Euro Weekly News, the latest government statistics show that around 20% of Spain’s population is now foreign-born, marking a major demographic shift.

As of January twenty twenty-five, over nine million residents out of around forty-seven million in Spain were born abroad, a stark contrast to the 0.5% foreign population in the nineteen seventies. Latin Americans, drawn by shared language and culture, form the largest group, while Moroccan, Chinese and Pakistani communities continue to grow.

Over to Murcia, south-eastern Spain, where public transport has been a hot topic. In recent budget adjustments, the Spanish government has failed to extend transport subsidies in Murcia. In response, the local government has pledged to maintain free transport for key groups, including pensioners, students, and unemployed residents.

José Ángel Alfonso, Mayor of Murcia, announced that the initiative would cost nearly €500,000 from municipal funds, ensuring citizens continue to benefit despite national cuts.

Local officials urged Spain’s government to restore subsidies to ease financial strain on municipalities and citizens.

Now to a mighty delay. The Spain-Morocco tunnel project which plans to link the two nations via an undersea tunnel, is facing a major delay, pushing its expected completion from twenty thirty to twenty forty.

On Tuesday, the 28th, Óscar Puente, Spain’s transport minister, confirmed the setback, citing complex geological conditions under the Strait of Gibraltar. The tunnel is planned to connect Punta Paloma in Southern Spain to Punta Malabata in northern Morocco, aiming to bolster rail transport between Europe and North Africa, but once complete, it may also accommodate road traffic.

A quick lesson in Spanish banking lingo and a caution: On Wednesday, the 29th, the Bank of Spain urged card users to check transactions before rejecting receipts. For sharp-eyed Spanish learners, recibo is the more formal term for a receipt, while copia is the more common phrase for payment slips and duplicates.

The bank says that the copia helps users verify charges, especially for contactless payments under fifty euros, warning that rushed payments can lead to unnoticed errors or fraud.

So next time you're asked, if you want a copy of the receipt or ¿Quieres copia?, a second look might be wise!

Feeling hungry? On Tuesday the 28th, Jesús Iván Anaya from Complejo Turístico Mirador de La Mancha took first place at the third Official Tapas and Pinchos Championship in Ciudad Real, Central Spain.

Anaya won with his innovative tapa called Perdiz, maíz y escabeche. The dish, featuring partridge pâté, creamy corn, pickled vegetables, and chipotle, highlights local Ciudad Real ingredients and creativity.

The event celebrated Spain’s gastronomic excellence. Second place went to José Luis Pardo from Lugo, in the northwest, for his tapa called Petisco Larpeiro, which is a scallop tartare with avocado cream, tomatoes and a white roll.

And if that wasn’t enough food talk. Want to know where the best sandwich is? Well, on Tuesday, the 28th, Aitor Martínez Ros, head chef of the Can Ros restaurant in Burriana, Castellón, Central Spain, won the twelfth Bocadillos de Autor contest and a 1,500 euro prize.

His creation, named Bugs Bunny, featured deboned rabbit shoulder with carrot, portobello mushrooms, truffle, and pickled onion in a traditional mollete bun, a soft round bread often found in the south.

It’s almost February, which can only mean that the famous Sitges Carnival is just around the corner.

The Carnival, based in Sitges, a Catalan coastal town, is set to go ahead between the 8th and 14th of February. The nearly week-long party promises extravagant celebrations attracting up to thousands annually.

Key events include Fat Thursday, marking the Carnival's start with the arrival of Rei Carnestoltes, the carnival king who is traditionally dressed in outlandish clothes representing the craziness of the festival and the hilarious bed race or as they call it in Catalan; la Cursa de Llits. Dressed-up participants race while pushing a bed or makeshift trolley, with one teammate riding on it. It’s always fun to see everyone’s creativity as each team will choose a different theme to decorate their bed floats.

On the 13th of February, there’s a huge parade featuring over fifty different colorful floats and dancers.

Anddd finally. What was Spain’s word for twenty twenty-four? On Wednesday, the 29th, the Fundación del Español Urgente, an organization that standardizes the use of Spanish and which is backed by the Royal Spanish Academy, selected Dana as the word of last year, recommending it is spelled in lowercase rather than capital letters.

In English, a Dana is a cut-off low, in Spanish it is short for Depresión Aislada en Niveles Altosand and refers to a meteorological phenomenon where cold air mass gets stuck at high altitudes, often causing intense storms and unsettled weather. And it's actually a Dana that caused severe flooding in southeastern Spain, leaving over 200 dead and many displaced.

Dana surpassed eleven other finalists, including turistificación, a borrowed concept from the English touristification referring to the explosion of tourism in a particular place changing the landscape and economics.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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¡Hasta la próxima!