The Formentera Office of Economy and Formentera Tax Office have submitted six projects to the Ministry of Tourism in response to a special call for submissions to a European Union financing scheme known as the Programme of Tourist Destination Plans for Sustainability. According to Bartomeu Escandell, the councillor for both departments, the island has requested a total of €4 million for actions related to green and sustainable transition, improved energy efficiency, the digital transition and competitiveness.

For her part, Consell de Formentera President Alejandra Ferrer remarked that the projects “leverage new technologies to achieve a cleaner, more energy-efficient and more competitive island and to improve the quality of life of residents and the experience of visitors”.

Green and sustainable transition

The first plans for which a grant of €300,000 has been requested involve smart access via Cavall den Borràs, Ses Illetes and Llevant beaches to the Ses Salines Natural Reserve. Since 2008, limited controls have been in place on vehicles entering the reserve, an enclave of immense ecological and scenic value. The plan’s architects propose harnessing new technologies to enhance and render more efficient of the existing process of manual controls. The aim is to ameliorate the experience of tourists and islanders accessing when the area and to safeguard the environmental and natural values it has historically represented.

Valued at €1 million, the second grant would fund plans for a new treatment and recycling plant for construction waste. Architects of the plan say waste management is increasingly key to ensuring efficient government actions, and that reusing local products and by-products is increasingly vital to reducing transport costs and transport-related pollution. This situation of cost overruns and excessive pollution is particularly concerning on islands, where products consumed must be imported, with the cost and CO₂-emission increases that such transport represents. The treatment and recycling plant would serve to transform waste from construction operations into by-products usable for public and private urban improvement and upgrades, drastically cutting CO2 emissions associated with continuous maritime travel, thereby reducing the attendant carbon footprint and growing the circular economy by fomenting locally-sourced products.

Improving energy efficiency

The third, €1.2 million grant would optimise use of public spaces and create a new source of renewable energy thanks to solar panel-equipped pergolas —the first would go up alongside arterials in Sant Francesc and Sant Ferran— featuring recharge points for electric vehicles. Part of Formentera’s commitment to replacing dirty energies with renewable ones and vehicles that pollute the environment with other, more eco-friendly options, the project would support more sustainable mobility, reduce the island’s energy dependence on outside sources, grow the Formentera’s fleet of electric vehicles and improve air quality.

Digital transition

A grant of €200,000 euros was additionally requested for a project dubbed Big Data Turística, Formentera — a model of tourism using mass data and in which decision-making in support of good governance is underpinned by data that are structured, dynamic and obtained in real time.

The proposal envisions a Smart Tourism System and smart destination system, mobilising data obtained with artificial intelligence —featured visions vary from socio-demographic, economic, environmental and tourism, to culture and heritage, mobility, education and sports and resident experience— to ensure competitive advantages for the destination in question.

The island requested a fifth, €300,000 grant for formentera.eco. The funding would give a boost to technical aspects of the scheme which, since 2019, has sought to regulate incoming vehicles and those which are driven on Formentera in summer.

Competitiveness

The sixth and final project, for which Formentera requested a grant in the amount of €1 million, involves road upgrades and new infrastructure in La Savina and Es Ca Marí. It marks a continuation of a host of initiatives which in recent years have expanded local infrastructure and delivered road improvements and pedestrian-only zones in urban centres. Such actions have offered a host of benefits, from making towns more accessible to local residents and removing vehicle traffic from within town centres, to reactivating commercial activity and enhancing appeal for tourists.

28 September 2021
Communications Office
Consell de Formentera

Consell de Formentera premiere Alejandra Ferrer, deputy premiere and entrepreneurship chief Ana Juan and economy and finance chief Bartomeu Escandell sat down with Manuel Porras, the director-general of economic promotion, entrepreneurship and social and circular economy for the regional government. The gathering, in which Porras reported on plans to offer a leg-up for Balearic businesses, was also attended by members of the local business community.

Ferrer welcomed Porras’s visit, which both administrations and island business viewed as a chance to work out details and ensure on-the-ground compatibility of government assistance, with attendees taking the opportunity to review Spanish and Balearic decrees on terms of the €855m economic injection for crisis-hit companies in the region.

Porras highlighted newly expanded eligibility criteria that will bring assistance to an additional 10 companies and 26 freelancers on Formentera, expanding the regional tally of aid beneficiaries to 176 companies and more than 300 self-employed workers.

Porras described the help as purpose-oriented and urged all eligible candidates to apply, pointing out disbursements would not be based on order of application submission. “We want the process to be simple”, confided the director-general, saying applicants could even count on early payout. The application period is expected to start by late May or early June, and the first freelancers could receive assistance by the end of next month.

New aid from Consell
President Ferrer said the island’s government and business leaders would closely monitor the Govern’s current proposal and make sure aid from the Consell moving forward addressed any blind spots and was as inclusive as possible. One hundred applications have been received in response to the Consell’s package of €630,000 in assistance for crisis-hit freelancers and small businesses. Payments are due to be issued as early as next week. Ferrer concluded by calling for a new meeting to finalise proposals and modifications with employers’ groups.

7 May 2021
Communications Department
Consell de Formentera

The Formentera Tax Office reports that, as first announced in April and as part of economic relief measures stemming from the pandemic, islanders will benefit from a two-month extension on this year’s payments of taxes and municipal fees. The new deadline is 1 December.

During the second half of September, individuals who have set up direct deposit will have taxes and fees automatically debited from their accounts. However, those that wish to postpone payment can do so by contacting their bank before 15 September and contacting the local headquarters of the Balearic tax office (Agència Tributària de les Illes Balears; C/Eivissa, 9; www.atib.es; tel. 971 321 577) prior to 1 December to avoid additional fees.

8 September 2020
Department of Communications
Consell de Formentera

The Formentera Department of Economy and Taxes has joined forces with the regional government in Palma to open up lines of support for the island’s productive sector, which department chief Bartomeu Escandell described as “uniquely reliant on self-employed workers—a group that has faced, and continues to face, immense hardship in the economic crisis following Covid-19”.

Four-hundred forty thousand—a quarter of a million from the Consell, €190,000 from the Govern—will go to support Formentera’s freelancers. Of the 1,460 local professionals with “autonomous worker” (autònom) status, 1,100 are registered year-round and the remainder only temporarily. “We’re extremely pleased that the two administrations were able to come together at this critical juncture in support of this particular group”, said Escandell. In the Balearics, local and regional authorities have together promised more than €15 million for a group numbering between eight and ten thousand.

The assistance will be calculated as follows:

1. Two thousand euros for applicants without staff on payroll. Seasonal freelancers will receive €2,500.

2. Two thousand five-hundred euros for applicants with fewer than 3 staff on payroll. Seasonal freelancers will receive €3,000.

3. Three thousand euros for applicants with three or more staff on payroll. Seasonal freelancers will receive €3,500.

Professionals must figure in one of the following categories to be eligible:

a) Individuals who, as a result of emergency orders in the wake of Covid-19, were forced to cease professional activity or reduce it by at least 75% (compared to 2019 figures).

b) Individuals furloughed for force majeur or economic and productive reasons.

c) Seasonal freelancers not included in a) or b) but directly or indirectly affected by Royal Decree 463/2020, later modified by Royal Decree 465/2020.

To apply:

The online application can be completed on the “Ajuts per reiniciar o continuar l’activitat dels autònoms afectats directament per la Covid-19” section of the Govern de les Illes Balears website. Details and a link to the application will be available on the website of the regional office of economic promotion, entrepreneurship and social and circular economy (http://dgpe.caib.es).

The Consell will also offer an information service for self-employed Formentera residents. It can be reached by phoning 971 321 087.

28 May 2020
Department of Communications
Consell de Formentera