DATAESTUR - an advancement in tourism intelligence

Yesterday, on the 2nd of December, the presentation of the new DATAESTUR web platform took place, as a result of the initiative of the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, accompanied by the State Society for the Management of Innovation and Tourism Technologies (SEGITTUR) .

The new website www.dataestur.com was created with the main purpose of providing the audience with data in form of statistics and reports related to the tourism sector and activity in Spain. The importance of having such a site proceeds from the need to have the data related to the activity of the sector, coming from different information sources, in a single site, where the necessary updated reports can be consulted with more agility and easiness.  

According to the minister, Reyes Maroto, in order to produce adequate tourism policies, it is essential to have information and data that are of the same appropriate nature. The listed purposes also incude: “To generate better public knowledge of the main magnitudes of tourism, to identify public and private sources that can be useful in order to know the sector or make decisions about it, and to design a system of production and access to data related to the management of public problems of destinations ”, according to the minister.

The web structures the data in five blocks, through which the information of a particular interest can be quickly accessed. These blocks are: general, economy, transport, accommodation and tourism knowledge.

Among the sources that provide the information to each respective block can be found those of the National Institute of Statistics, Ministry of Culture and Sports, UNWTO, Integral System of Tourist Quality in Destinations (SICTED), Institute for Spanish Tourism Quality (ICTE), Telefónica, Bank of Spain, Turespaña, AENA, State Ports, RENFE, General Directorate of Roads, SEGITTUR, Scientific Information System for Tourism (SICTUR) and Spanish universities. By having the varied sources in each block, each data segment can be covered in detail and in the broadest way possible.

This would be one of the steps towards digitalization and modernization that companies and destinations are betting on in this new era, as they manifest in order to apply for European funds, trying to make a competitive difference for the country.