Actualidad

Promotur Turismo de Canarias officially announces the award of incentives to open up 24 new routes designed to increase the archipelago’s regular international connections by 240,000 extra seats each year.

The call for applications, allocated a maximum of 3.7 million euros, is part of the Canary Islands’ Flight Development Fund, an instrument to improve flight connections that has been implemented by the Turismo de Canarias after approval from the European Commission. It is the first case that meets the restrictive European regulations on subsidies for starting up new routes.

Flight connections are a main priority for the Canary Islands’ government due to their contribution to the economic development of the archipelago and are key to the strategy of diversifying tourism markets. This is the reason why the new call by the Flight Development Fund is so important, and has already managed to establish 18 new regular connections with the islands which will help the Canary Islands to compete with other destinations.

Connections with new cities and new types of tourists

The Flight Development Fund, as with the rest of the activities that are performed to improve flight connections, lies mainly with bringing the islands closer to new cities with which they do not currently have regular flight connections. It also aims to welcome a new segment of tourists who, compared to the traditional tourists who until only a few years ago were the archipelago’s main visitors, prefer to organise their holidays themselves to tailor them to their own motivations and interests.

Once the incentives have been awarded to the airlines, who commit to running them for at least two years, the new routes that could be started up thanks to this call for applications would connect airports in the Canary Islands to Switzerland, Poland, France, the United States, Germany, Slovakia, Italy, Portugal, Austria, Iceland, Holland, Ireland, Finland, Latvia, Romania and Bulgaria.

The call for applications is flexible in the majority of cases and airlines can choose between only operating on a seasonal basis (just winters or summers) or continuously throughout the year. In some cases, there is also the possibility for the airline to start with one or two regular slots. Each potential route has an allocated budget and the call contains the overall maximum budget.

All of the calls for applications of the Flight Development Fund are the result of a detailed understanding between Turismo de Canarias and the Island Councils, in terms of the strategic interest, feasibility and lack of previous connections on these routes. The sum of the incentive is a final nudge for international airlines, who are normally considering a high number of options that the Canary Island destinations have to compete with.

New call for applications for the incentives of the Flight Development Fund: