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In addition to the well-known -FITUR in Madrid and ITB in Berlin-, the Canary Islands brand was present in more than 20 tourist fairs the first three months of 2018, 85% co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER). Dublin, Moscow, Brussels, Vienna, Stuttgart, Helsinki, Düsseldorf, Nantes, Utrecht and Milan, are only some of the cities that not only Promotur Turismo de Canarias went to, but also representatives from other island business promotion entities within the sector.

Currently, Turismo de Canarias combines a mainly digital approach for its promotional activities with the active presence in the most significant tourist fairs in Europe. Many of them either with a professional profile or focused on specific elements of great interest for the islands such as diving, nature or conferences. The goal is to strengthen the leadership in tourism of the islands in more traditional markets and deepen the market diversification strategies.

Hungary, a growing market

Aiming to attract tourists from non traditional markets but with great future potential, there’s been a participation, fora second year in a row, in the UTAZAS fair held in Budapest. Hungary is a growing market that has improved its air connectivity with the Canary Islands since 2016, when new routes were set up in winter and summer. A connectivity and promotion project in the Hungarian market that has paid off with a 60% increase of Hungarian tourists in 2017 with regard to the previous year. More specifically, last year almost 43,000 passengers came directly from Hungary, whereas in 2016 there were 26,552. There are currently four direct routes with airlines WizzAir and Ryanair connecting Budapest with Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, Tenerife and Gran Canaria.

Russia and Portugal increase their travel demand

This is also the objective behind this Canarian presence at the MITT in Moscow, backed by the recovery of the international travel demand of the Russian market. This strongly professional fair, is a chance to recover and encourage the growth of a market that benefits from the progressive strengthening of the rouble and other signs of financial recovery.

Something similar is happening in Portugal, only the first month of the year already showed a 16.4% increase in the number of tourists with regard to January 2017. Portugal is in the recovery process and that is portrayed by an increase in travelling capacity. The Canary Islands has taken part in two events in 2018, in Oporto and Aveiro, aimed at families and coinciding with the improvements in air connectivity with Portugal in the past two years. The new routes from Lisbon and Oporto have made it possible this winter to have direct flights grow 325% with regard to the previous year.