The tourism sector on the Costa del Sol faces the dilemma between the fear of losing permanent seasonal workers and the risk of hiring more staff than necessary.

At this time of year, on the eve of Holy Week, the tourism sector would typically have all its staff ready to operate for the first influx of tourists of the year, but circumstances are not the same. The disconnection from high-speed services and the high fuel prices that increase travel costs both by car and plane have led to a need "to be prudent and conservative," states the president of Mahos, the hospitality industry's leading employer organization, as specified by its president, Javier Frutos. He recalls that this sector employs an average of 95,000 workers in January and February, increasing this workforce to 103,000 in April, coinciding with Holy Week, which marks the start of the high season. "It is a Holy Week with extraordinary factors, so the pace of hiring is more restrained, although it may eventually be at levels similar to last year," he notes.

In this context, the president of the Costa del Sol Beach Business Association, Manuel Villafaina, describes the current scenario where entrepreneurs face the dilemma between the fear of losing their permanent seasonal workers, who are the first to be called into the reinforcement teams and who might leave to work in other businesses or sectors if not summoned, or the risk of bolstering the workforce with more staff than necessary given the uncertainty of the response from domestic tourism. Villafaina asserts that the balance has tipped towards the option of risking rather than losing personnel who are already known and trained.

Meanwhile, the vice president of the Costa del Sol Hotel Business Association (Aehcos), Javier Hernández, agrees that at this time of the year, this sector has employed almost all of the 6,000 jobs that make up the reinforcements for the high season, most of whom are permanent seasonal workers. "Hotels are betting that as reservations evolve, they will make calls. First to the permanent seasonal workers and then to new hires. The current situation of falling demand and so much uncertainty calls for prudence," says Hernández.