THE TOURISM IN SPAIN

1. INTRODUCCION
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

ECONOMY AND THE RESTAURATIONS

LEVEL OF ENGLISH IN SPAIN
PERSONAL OPINION
BEACH AND WEATHER
HISTORY AND CULTURES

1. Introduccin
Spain has the most competitive tourism industry in the world, a global study
by the World Economic Forum (WEF) has found.
For the first time the country has come out on top of a list of 141 nations
analyzed in The Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report, issued every two
years by the same organization behind the Davos Forum.
The report takes into account 90 individual indicators measuring elements
such as a destinations natural and cultural resources, its health and
hygiene conditions, its travel infrastructure, its security levels, its price
competitiveness and its adaptation to new technologies.

After Spain, the best-performing nations are France, Germany, United States,
Britain, Switzerland, Australia, Italy, Japan and Canada.
The report notes that Spain is the third-most-visited country in the world, with
around 60.6 million annual arrivals, and has growth prospects thanks to an influx
of tourists from emerging markets, including China, Brazil and Mexico.

2. Level of english in spain

According to a recent study by The Hay Group, 70% of Spanish

executives do not speak English, one of the highest levels in Europe.
However, only 40% said they were disadvantaged in their careers due to
poor mastery of English.
Each year, 100,000 people in Spain pass the Cambridge ESOL exam in
order to prove their proficiency in English when applying for a job.
However, only 17% of the Spanish workforce officially works in the
tourism industry, so English proficiency is not required in the workplace
for the vast majority of the population.
To start, it is a fact that all students study English in Spain in primary and
secondary schools. In the school year 2007/2008 English became a high
priority for the Spanish Ministry of Education and the starting age of
learning English was dropped from 8 to 6.
In the last ten years, regional governments have trained thousands of
students and teachers in ESL and paid for many training courses abroad
in an attempt to increase the level of foreign language education in
Spanish schools. In 2007, as part of a national effort to improve the
mastery of foreign languages, the Ministry of Education established a
program commonly known as MEC scholarship to fund language
courses abroad for teachers and students from the age of 15. Since then,

more than 150,000 students have spent three weeks studying abroad at
government expense, and 10,000 teachers have received fellowships to
train professionally abroad.

Despite the ubiquity of English in schools, a recent study by the Center

for Sociological Research (CIS) showed that 63% of the Spanish
population claims not to speak English and only 23% say they speak it
well. Even though learning English has changed significantly in the
Spanish educational system in the last decade, the results of this change
have yet to be seen in the adult population.
3. Personal opinion