Spain is calling on the UK travel trade to bolster tourism from Britain whilst promising substantial finance as part of a sustainable recovery to make it a “better place” to visit than before the pandemic.

Director-general of the Spanish Tourist Office, Miguel Sanz, unveiled a four-year plan on the first day of the World Travel Market, targeted at revitalising tourism to the country.

“In the first phase, we want a speedy recovery [in tourism] but we will need help from our partners in the British tourist industry,” Sanz said.

“Britain is our single most important country. We need each other. We hope to work closely with you.”

Within the recovery he went on to say: “We have signed different marketing agreements in the last few months with different companies in the sector to increase connectivity to our islands and mainland Spain.”

As part of the second phase of the tourism sector’s recovery, the director-general of the Spanish Tourist Office said Spain was investing €3.4 billion over the next three to six years to make the country more sustainable, says a Travel Weekly report.

He added: “We don’t want to go back to 2019, we want to go to a better place. We are inventing that better place and committing billions of euros to create a more sustainable destination.”

Investment won’t solely be focused on environmental sustainability, but also in socio and economic sustainability, aiming to keep tourism as “a force for good” while making money for businesses in the sector, he stated.

“We are committing to socio-sustainability, a strategy that looks after the environment but also the communities and the economy. You can count on us,” he commented.

Furthermore, José Pascual Marco Martínez, Spanish ambassador to the UK, said the country was planning to spend €75 billion on a “green and digital revolution” which would “flow into the tourism sector”.

“We will build back a sector that is more sustainable. We want to position ourselves at the vanguard of sustainability,” he added.