Portugal’s Ministry of the Interior has introduced a new initiative with a total of 20 measures, including the plan to increase the number of workers in the tourism industry by a total of 20 per cent.
Such in agenda for the tourism profession was introduced by the secretary of state for tourism, commerce and services, Nuno Fazenda, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports.
“This is a strategic agenda, with 20 measures, which aims to surge by 10 per cent the number of tourism professionals with secondary and higher education, and to increase by 15 per cent the number of students in tourism at all levels of education and to increase by 20 per cent the number of people employed in the sector,” the Ministry of the Economy and Maritime Affairs pointed out in this regard.
According to the Fazenda, the measures also include the national plan for modernisation as well as specialisation of the hotel as well as tourism school network and the implementation of an international tourism academy.
He said that the agenda that is still being prepared aims to make the country the reference destination to work and study as well as in the tourism industry.
Fazenda has considered that valuing the industry’s professionals is important if the country wants to have more and better tourism. He added that investing in people and also increasing their qualifications, as well as income and recognition is the strategic focus in order to prepare the future of the growing activity.
“This is also an agenda with action to meet the present challenges. To achieve the objectives as well as goals presented in this agenda, the mobilisation and involvement of everyone will be fundamental,” Fazenda pointed out in this regard.
The National Statistics Institute (INE) of Portugal revealed that tourist accommodation establishments opened their doors to a total of 1.5 million travellers and recorded 3.5 million overnight stays in the first month of this year.
The statistics reveal that there was recorded a surge of 72.5 per cent and 74.5 per cent, respectively, compared to the figures of the same period last year. At the same time, the external markets registered a total of 2.4 million overnight stays, thus doubling the number of overnight stays in January last year.
However, despite the significant increase in the number of international visitors, authorities in Portugal are dealing with significant labour shortages noted in many industries, including the hospitality industry.
A similar problem is also facing its neighbouring country Spain. Recently, the human resources company Randstad said that Spain needs more than 60,000 additional workers in order to manage the significant worker shortage with which the country is dealing.