Toni Pérez argues that the Innovation Hub will make Benidorm a “focus of attraction for talent and development”

The mayor, Toni Pérez, has defended today that the Innovation Hub that will begin to take shape in the next few weeks will position Benidorm as a “focus of attraction for talent, development, innovation and competitiveness”. Toni Pérez conveyed this idea at the informative breakfast that he led today at the Executive Forum that has been held in Madrid and which was attended by, among others, Borja Fanjul, second deputy mayor of the Madrid City Council; Luis Martínez, general secretary of the FEMP, as well as representatives of companies from various economic sectors. César Chiva from the Executive Forum and José Cámara, territorial representative of Serveo, have presented the mayor of Benidorm.

According to Pérez, this “technological centre” will encourage technological companies to develop “pilot projects of open innovation” to provide solutions to the new challenges of tourism and city management, thus advancing to “a higher level”.

“Today we already analyse different parameters: water and energy consumption, waste production, city mobility, environmental measurements (such as temperature, comfort index, ultraviolet radiation, etc.) or measurements of the range of the economy such as overnight stays, number and origin of tourists, employment or types of products they demand,” he said. However, with the implementation of the Hub we will reach “a space for technological testing, for generating previously discussed solutions.”

A Hub includes a Sustainability Observatory, whose launch will go hand in hand with the implementation in Benidorm of the State-wide Smart Destination Platform promoted by Segittur, which will result in “a true revolution in public tourism policies”. Toni Pérez has highlighted that the choice of Benidorm as the headquarters of this platform is the result of the “great effort” in digitalisation and innovation made by the city, “with initiatives that are always scalable and adaptable to other destinations” and configuring “the first space for data sharing”.

The mayor has emphasised that experience shows that “the shared use of data improves efficiency” in management since these “are key to decision-making”. In this regard, he has delved into the city's own data – such as water or waste data –, those shared through different tools with the hotel association Hosbec or the water concessionaire Hidraqua, or those that are worked collaboratively with other companies or organisations.

The intelligent management of this data makes it possible, he stressed, “to generate efficient policies to be the best place to live, and therefore the best place to visit”, promoting “maximum economic and social sustainability” and strengthening “environmental sustainability”. Precisely “promoting this triple sustainability is what drives us to implement future initiatives” around the main activity of the city: tourism.

Regarding environmental sustainability, based in Benidorm on efficient management of resources and its urban planning model that protects 60% of the territory, Toni Pérez has endorsed the commitment to “blue tourism”, a new approach that “prioritises the conservation of marine and coastal ecosystems while promoting sustainable development” and that “is not only a response to the growing demands of travel, but also an urgent need to preserve our natural and cultural resources”.

In economic and social matters, Toni Pérez has insisted on the capacity of tourism to generate employment and redistribute wealth. In fact, “Benidorm creates more jobs -60,000- than the working-age population registered -50,000-”, and “has managed to reduce its unemployment rate last July”.

The mayor explained that the figures and objectives achieved by Benidorm in environmental, economic and social sustainability and the firm commitment to digitalisation, technology and innovation have favoured the city, which is the destination, becoming a stage and testing laboratory for European projects such as U-welcome (to validate the drone navigation space in the European Union), Delorean and Sonora (linked to the transport of goods through the use of drones), or SCORE (to increase the climate resilience of coastal cities).

Toni Pérez has expressed his conviction that Benidorm's potential to attract the interest of technology companies will be confirmed and increased with the launch of the Innovation Hub.

Underfunding
During his speech the mayor once again stressed the underfunding suffered by the Town Councils, which are “the administrations closest to the citizens”; a situation that is worsened in destinations such as Benidorm, which is still not recognised as a “tourist municipality”. Toni Pérez once again called for fair funding for tourist municipalities based on VAT, so that each town participates in “a percentage” of this tax generated in its territory.