Back and forth at the helm of the Canary Islands government
In the Canary Islands, as in the rest of Spain, the 1978 constitution set the rules for the political arena. Since then, the country has become a constitutional monarchy, with Felipe VI as Head of State, succeeding his father Juan Carlos I after his abdication in 2014. The same constitution transferred a significant share of decision-making power to the regions, and since August 10, 1982, the Canaries have had autonomous status, like the other 16 Spanish regions.
On the executive side, local government is exercised by the Gobierno de Canarias, headed by a president who sits alternately, every 4 years, in Santa Cruz de Tenerife or Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. On the legislative front, it is the parliament (70 members elected for 4 years and permanently seated in Santa Cruz) that has the final say. Administratively, the community is divided into 2 provinces: Tenerife, which includes La Palma, La Gomera and El Hierro, with Santa Cruz de Tenerife as its capital, and Gran Canaria, which includes Fuerteventura and Lanzarote, with Las Palmas de Gran Canaria as its capital. Each of the 7 islands is also governed by a cabildo, a kind of island municipal council, which enjoys a degree of autonomy in the areas of culture, tourism, the environment, health, roads and water, elected by direct universal suffrage for a 4-year term.
The regional elections of May 2019 marked a turning point in the governance of the Canary Islands, with Ángel Victor Torres, PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party), taking the helm of the Gobierno. This followed the so-called "Las flores" pact between the PSOE, winner of the regional elections, Nueva Canarias, Podemos and Agrupación Socialista Gomera, which put an end to almost 30 years in power by Coalición Canaria, a grouping of nationalist parties that had held the post since its creation in 1993, often after an agreement with the right-wing PP (Partido Popular). The regional elections of May 2023 saw another turn in the other direction, with Coalición Canaria returning to power and former president Fernando Clavijo Battle (CC) at the head of the Gobierno. Although the PSOE came out on top in these elections, it did not have an absolute majority, not least because of the collapse of its ally Podemos. This majority was obtained via a government agreement between the PP and the CC, which was joined by the ASG Agrupación Socialista Gomera and the Agrupación Herreña Independiente (close to the PP).
The preponderance of tourism
The Canary Islands' economy is heavily dominated by services, with the tertiary sector alone employing almost three-quarters of the working population and generating a similar percentage of GDP (gross domestic product). This is a long-standing trend that has only increased over the years. This sector is itself heavily dominated by tourism, which accounts for an average of around 40% of tertiary sector jobs and 35% of its GDP. Even if the money earned does not always benefit the islands, since the many foreign companies present here often invest the money earned in their own countries, or pay their annual taxes at head offices in mainland France. In addition, other activities in the secondary sector are highly dependent on tourism, such as construction, which employs almost 8% of the working population and nearly half of all jobs in the secondary sector. While this activity made a significant contribution to the archipelago's economy from the late 1990s to the early 2000s, it was profoundly affected by the 2008 financial crisis, which led to the freezing and abandonment of many building sites, the "corpses" of which can still be seen today, as removing them would be far too expensive. In the secondary sector, Tenerife and Gran Canaria account for 80% of industrial companies and over 90% of jobs generated by this sector. Industry has also developed in port activities and oil refining (with the largest center in Santa Cruz de Tenerife), as well as in the agri-food sector, associated with the refrigeration industry. With only 10% of the land under cultivation, agriculture plays only a minor role in the Canary Islands' economy. The main products are barley, wheat, vines, potatoes, bananas and tomatoes, marketed in Spain and Europe.
And always the ground y playa
While the arrival of European elites in search of calm and good health led to the installation of luxury tourist infrastructures in the north of Tenerife as early as the end of the 19th century, the tourism boom, which began in the 1960s with the development of regular shipping services between the islands and with mainland France, and was accentuated in the 1970s by the multiplication of air transport, gave rise to a completely different tourism model. Instead, the result was the creation of numerous hotel complexes in the south of almost all the islands, offering sol y playa vacations at the lowest possible cost. Although often denounced by certain tourism professionals who would like to see it replaced by quality tourism that promotes the archipelago's culture and inner riches, this Anglo-Saxon model of tourism development continues to flourish. Perhaps also because the English are still the Canaries', as well as Spain's, biggest market. In 2023, the Canaries will remain Spain's third most popular tourist destination, after Catalonia and the Balearic Islands. And the archipelago received over 14 million foreign tourists, a million more than in 2019, the last year before the Covid pandemic, but less than its record of 15 million in 2017. The English came first (1 in 10 foreign visitors), followed by the French (nearly 12%) and then the Germans (nearly 11%). Some 60,000 Canary Islanders, spread across all the islands, have also come out to protest against this mass tourism. On April 20, 2024, gathered under the banner " Canarias se agota ", they expressed their wish to see this sector evolve towards a " more diversified and sustainable " development model, generating less pressure on the islands (rising rents, saturation of public services such as health, water distribution...) and contributing to a better distribution of income from a sector responsible for over 35% of GDP and 40% of jobs.
