Formigal looks like a ghost urbanization these days. The ski lifts at the station are stopped; the apartments, empty; the streets, deserted; and almost all businesses (hotels, shops, bars and restaurants), without activity. The image spans all the tourist areas of the Pyrenean valleys, where the very few lodgings in operation are considering closing after the Government of Aragon announced on Saturday that the regional and provincial confinement will continue beyond the initially announced January 12, until the 31st.
The situation of winter tourism linked to snow is “dramatic”, “agonizing”, “to the limit”, say the businessmen. They have spent a blank month since the theoretical start of the season on the Constitution Bridge, and they face another without the possibility of arrival of customers. The closure of almost all ski resorts due to mobility limitations has put 1,300 workers who depend directly on the snow sector out of work, but there are another 12,000 indirect jobs and 45,000 closed beds within a 35-kilometer radius around the slopes.
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“Hardly anyone has a job”
Álex Masonet, owner of a store in Formigal. “People in the valley live off tourism, 80% from Sabiñánigo upwards, and now almost no one has a job. Some former employees call me desperate but I can’t hire them”
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The sector moves 150 million euros per season. Without customers on the December long weekend or at Christmas, they have already lost 40% of their turnover, according to the Huesca Hospitality and Tourism Association. “Practically all the businesses remain closed,” says the manager, Silvia Fernández, who does not forget the rebound effect throughout the valley economy.
That percentage has already fallen short with the extension of the restrictions. Taking as a reference the figures from last winter (the current season promised abundant snow from the beginning), the Pyrenees will lose between December and January more than 157,000 travelers and almost 420,000 overnight stays in hotels, tourist apartments and rural accommodation. Hotels, the sector that drags the most employment, registered 59,361 travelers in December 2019, according to the INE, who will no longer recover, and 63,761 in January 2020, which in view of the announced limitations will not arrive either. In the case of apartments, 9,759 and 9,000 clients have stayed on the road; and for rural accommodation, 10,775 and 4,752 tourists.
“We need geographic mobility, at least within Aragon. It is the minimum for businesses to start, so they can open stations or shops thanks to second homes “, says Jesús Pellejero, president of the Tourist Association of the Valley of Tena. “We have 9,000 accommodation places, almost all of them empty, and 90% of the restaurants are closed. There are only a few family hotels open, but in order to start up the large ones, those with more than 100 rooms, clients from outside must also arrive. “.
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“We will hold out as long as possible”
“Our intention is to try to endure as long as possible, we do not set deadlines, we make plans day by day or week by week. The next horizon is Reyes, then we will see what happens,” says the commercial director of the Astún station.
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Pellejero looks with envy at stations like Baqueira, where you can go skiing proving a second residence or a hotel reservation. “It is said that the English, Russian, French …”. In some Catalan slopes there are no longer passes available for days when the capacity is full.
“With many nerves and uncertainty, the sector lives pending of the sanitary data”, assures the president of the businessmen of the valley of Tena, who criticizes the absence of an aid plan. The promise of the Government of Aragon of incentives to attract skiers when the closures are lifted is considered clearly insufficient to mitigate the losses, especially after the new blow received.
“If the opening is delayed, some businesses will no longer have an exit”, says Álex Masonet, owner of a ski equipment and sportswear store in Formigal, who does not know how long it will be able to remain open. “I have received 100% of the products from the suppliers and I have hardly worked for two months”, since the highest volume of sales, between 40 and 50%, occurs between December 6 and January 6, and at its price, before the sales. Last winter he had 10 workers and this one, three, who on day 1 went to Erte, staying alone as a freelancer. Suppliers have delayed payments, “but it is not the solution because no money comes in.” It won’t last much longer. “They should give us non-payment aid because this is like a natural catastrophe “.
According to this commercial entrepreneur, “Aragon has forgotten winter tourism while on weekends in the cities the shopping centers are bursting.” They have even opened skating rinks. “The people in the valley live off tourism, 80% from Sabiñánigo upwards, and now almost no one has a job. Some former temps call me desperate, but I can’t hire them“, he comments.
![Pedro Urieta, president of FADI at the CETDI press conference / Soledad Campo /[[[HA ARCHIVO]]]](https://i0.wp.com/imagenes.heraldo.es/files/image_234_v3/files/fp/uploads/imagenes/2021/01/03/pedro-urieta-director-de-la-escuela-de-esqui-de-formigal.r_d.639-467-1625.jpeg?w=900&ssl=1)
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“I don’t know what will happen if they don’t open the tracks”
“At the school we have 250 monitors, people with families, mortgages … The situation becomes dramatic, I don’t know what will happen if the slopes do not open,” says the director of the Formigal Ski School.
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Neither contract nor Erte
Among the thousands of unemployed people are ski instructors. The Formigal school employs 250 people, who cannot qualify for an Erte as they are seasonal contracts that have not started. “They are people with a family, a mortgage …, the situation is becoming dramatic, I don’t know what will happen if they don’t open the tracks. We have looked at how to help them, but they tell us that if the season has not started, we cannot hire them . I receive calls from monitors who need to work, “says Pedro Urieta, its director, who understands the sanitary measures but does not know why the aid does not arrive, when the school has invested in contracting insurance and in sanitary protocols. “All are good words, but nothing more, and families have to eat every day.”
Astún is the only station open in Aragon. With the residents of the province as the only clients, it hardly receives skiers. His intention, says his commercial director, Andrés Pita, “is to try to hold out as long as possible, we do not set deadlines, we make plans day by day or week by week”. The next horizon is Reyes, “later we will see.”
Among the few businesses that are underway, there is also the hotel and the Llanos del Hospital station (Benasque). The complex started the season with Aragonese clients in mind, but being limited to Huesca, occupancy has been “very, very low,” according to manager Fernando Pañart. “The turnover is 15-20% while the workforce is 50%”.
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“We bill 15 or 20%”
“The turnover is 15-20% and the workforce is at 50%. The Huesca client has reacted well, it has motivated us to remain open, despite losing money, but we do not know what will happen tomorrow,” warns Fernando Pañart, Manager of Llanos del Hospital.
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The occupation on these dates would touch one hundred percentHowever, it has not exceeded 15%. On the 30th eight clients slept in a hotel with 53 rooms and the maximum came on New Year’s Eve, with about 60.
“The client from Huesca has reacted well, it has motivated us to remain open, even though we lose money. The problem is that we do not know what will happen tomorrow.” Pañart it anxiously awaits each appearance of the Government of Aragon to announce new measures. He hoped to open mobility within the Community on the 12th, “because the businesses in Huesca cannot live disconnected from Zaragoza.” As it lasts until January 31, he waits to see how the new limitations affect the hospitality industry to make a decision today, but with the provincial closure he says that he will only be able to open on weekends. “We face an uncertain future,” he concludes.
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