The mayor argues that “there will be no sustainability without efficient management of resources, territory and services”

The mayor of Benidorm, Toni Pérez, stated today that “there can be no sustainability without efficient management of resources, land, and services.” Pérez defended Benidorm's model as “the design of an absolutely sustainable and efficient city in terms of urban planning” and asserted that the next step was for this sustainability to extend to resource management, “whose greatest challenge was, without a doubt, water.”

The mayor made these statements during his participation in the roundtable discussion ‘Investing in Sustainable Local Tourism,’ part of a conference on Sustainable Development and the 2030 Agenda celebrated in Vall d’Uxó, Castellón, and organised by the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces (FEMP).

Thus, regarding the major challenge of water, the mayor emphasised that in the last 25 years, “we have reduced water consumption by 18%, even though during this time our population has grown by 40% and hotel stays by 26%.”

He insisted that the efficiency of the drinking water network stands at 96% – “of every 100 drops injected into the network, only four are lost” – compared to the Spanish average, which ranges between 65% and 70%. Furthermore, he highlighted the fact that the city “is deploying the municipality’s fourth water network, the reclaimed water network, to make it available to homeowners' associations so they can irrigate their green spaces with treated wastewater instead of drinking water, thereby reducing consumption by 15%.”

The use of technology applied to water management is also allowing us to "anticipate potential network issues and facilitate the planning of hydraulic infrastructure renewal projects." In this regard, he said that the BeCiTi tourism innovation centre "has already launched its first Open Innovation challenge: measuring and certifying the water footprint of hotel establishments." The mayor also emphasised that the local tourism sector is deeply involved in this territory, "and has been promoting actions and measures for years focused on making its daily operations more sustainable, so that the footprint of its activity is as small as possible."

Regarding environmental sustainability, Toni Pérez referred to the preservation of the land and revealed that the city has offset the carbon footprint generated over the last ten years by promotional activities carried out by Visit Benidorm, "by reforesting a dry area through the planting of 1,227 trees, the equivalent of a new 1.2-hectare forest capable of capturing 249 tons of CO2." He also highlighted the “social sustainability” achieved with record Social Security affiliation and an unemployment rate below double digits.”

Similarly, in his speech, the mayor referred to the results of the annual tourism survey conducted by the Pedro Zaragoza Orts Chair of Tourism Studies, which measured tourists' sustainable habits while at the destination. “The survey shows that 88.61% of tourists use water rationally, and almost 85% claim to maintain the recycling and reuse habits they practice in their home countries during their holidays.”

“No model is viable without the involvement of the private sector and the support of the community. It is necessary to align businesses, workers, and residents around the same objectives, fostering best practices, innovation, and shared responsibility.

When tourism generates real benefits for the local population—in the form of stable employment, better services, and a higher quality of life—a virtuous cycle is established,” added the mayor, who advocated for “working from the local level to achieve a global impact.” “Talking about global impact means talking about the sum of many well-directed local decisions. Therefore, sustainable tourism cannot be based on isolated actions or one-off measures, but must be part of the city's overall model,” he emphasised.

Finally, Pérez detailed five elements “that we consider essential” and cited cross-cutting principles because “sustainable tourism only works if it is integrated into all municipal policies”; data-driven planning, “since without data, sustainability remains just talk”; and the training of technical teams, “as digital and sustainable transformation requires skilled professionals.” Collaboration “between administrations, with the private sector, with universities and with citizens”; and continuity over time “because sustainability is not built in a mandate, but requires constancy, evaluation and the ability to adapt”.