Analysis and comparison of tourism competitiveness in Spanish coastal areas

Abstract

Spain is one of the four world leaders in coastal tourism. To keep the top position in such a highly competitive market, coastal managers in Spain need to constantly monitor the social, ecological, and economic components of ‘sun and sea’ tourism. Thus, the main goals of the present study are to analyse the most visited Spanish coastal destinations and to evaluate their competitiveness relative to each other. Indicator analysis was applied to evaluate seaside destinations pursuant to socio-economic and physico-geographical parameters. Results show that the most competitive destination is the Canary Islands, followed by Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, Valencia, Andalusia and Murcia.