The cruises return to the Spanish ports to recover the 6,000 million lost in the last year - Cruise activities attempt recover 6000 millions USD lost 2020 - The tourism sector has been anchored for more than a year, like the vast majority of cruises worldwide.

Now, and since all the activity stopped in March 2020, the boats have started to sail and the trip on board will be like never before because of the strict safety protocols to prevent contagion.

Malaga received yesterday morning the Mein Schiff 2, from TUI Cruises, which was the first ship to dock in a peninsular port and the first to benefit from the lifting of restrictions approved by the Government on June 7, according to CincoDías.

From that day –which coincides with other measures of openness to tourism such as the entry permit to Spain for all travelers vaccinated without other restrictions or the acceptance of the antigen test for those who are not–, international cruises can include Spain in their itinerary.

Cruise activities attempt recover 6000 millions USD lost 2020

This opening is a necessary step for the recovery of an industry that before the pandemic entered 6,000 million euros a year and 40,000 jobs thanks to the 600,000 travelers who boarded these large ships.

Then it will be the turn of Costa Cruceros, owned by Carnival, which from July 5 will travel the Mediterranean with stops in Barcelona, Palma, Messina, Rome, Savona and Marseille.

Cruise activities attempt recover 6000 millions USD lost 2020: Further on, the Costa Firenze will sail for 7 nights and dock in Barcelona, Marseille, Savona, Rome and Naples.

On September 26, and for 2 weeks, the Costa Diadema will leave Barcelona to the Turkish cities of Istanbul and Izmir, and, from November 12, will pass through Barcelona, Savona, Marseille, Malaga, Cadiz, Lisbon, Gibraltar and Valencia.

Cruise activities attempt recover 6000 millions USD lost 2020

MSC Cruises will resume its activity in our country on July 26 with a boat that will leave Barcelona to sail the Mediterranean for 7 days with stops in Genoa, Civitavecchia, Rome, Naples, Palermo and Malta. From the 30th of the same month, another trip will start from Valencia with stops in Barcelona, Genoa, Florence, Pisa, Civitavecchia and Rome.

Aida Cruises will return to Spain from July 10 to October 30 with 2 round trips from Palma de Mallorca that will make stops in Cadiz, Malaga, Cartagena, Barcelona, Alicante, Ibiza and Valencia.

For its part, Pullmantur expects to reach the Mediterranean from August 15 with stops in Barcelona and Palma de Mallorca. It will be operated by Royal Caribbean (which holds 49% of the company's capital) following Pullmantur's bankruptcy in May 2020 that ended with an ERE of 95% of the workforce.

Cruise activities attempt recover 6000 millions USD lost 2020

More news:

Competition opens a sanctioning file to Sabadell, Santander, CaixaBank and Bankia for the conditions required in the loans guaranteed by the ICO

The National Market and Competition Commission (CNMC) has initiated a disciplinary case against several entities for possible restrictive practices of competition in the marketing of loans guaranteed by the ICO to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Competition has investigated whether Sabadell, Santander, CaixaBank and Bankia requested links to different products as a condition for customers to access the ICO COVID guarantee lines.

These guarantees, recalls the CNMC, were enabled by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, in 2020, to facilitate access to credit and liquidity to companies and self-employed and deal with the economic and social impact of COVID-19.

Competition has also investigated the possible use of credit as a mechanism to restructure pre-existing financial debts.

Following the analysis carried out, Competition considers that "the actions of the banks under investigation would deviate from the good faith required of the companies in their relations with customers". Consequently, their practices could have altered the economic behavior of consumers who turned to these entities to subscribe to ICO credits. "All this could imply a distortion of free competition and would have affected the public interest," says the CNMC in a statement.

The investigation is based on information received by the CNMC through the mailbox covid.competencia@cnmc.es The Commission activated this channel during the state of alarm last year so that companies and citizens could inform the institution of possible anti-competitive practices that were taking place in the markets.

The initiation of the case takes place under article 3 of Law 15/2007, of July 3, on the Protection of Competition (LDC), in relation to article 4 of Law 3/1991, of January 10, on Unfair Competition.

This opens a maximum period of 18 months for the investigation of the case and for its resolution by the CNMC, without the initiation of this case prejudging the final result of the investigation.