Speaking to the Lusa news agency, the president of ERT for Alentejo and Ribatejo, José Manuel Santos, highlighted that the Alentejo region surpassed, for the first time, “3.2 million overnight stays”, in 2024, with “130,000 more overnight stays” than in the previous year.

“It was a year in which we grew more than 4% [in the number of overnight stays], above the national average, in sustained growth”, because “we cannot always grow in double digits, as happened in 2023”, said the executive.

José Manuel Santos spoke about the preliminary results of tourism activity for 2024, released last week by the National Institute of Statistics (INE).

The leader of this ERT noted that the Alentejo had “slightly higher growth in external demand” compared to internal demand, highlighting that it was the region of mainland Portugal that “grew the most in revenue, with a rise of 12%”.

“The Alentejo is increasingly a destination that sells itself to more people and at a higher price”, he highlighted, acknowledging that the results are “the fruit of the work, first and foremost, of businesspeople, hotels, rural tourism, entertainment and restaurants”.

USA tourists

As for foreign markets, the executive highlighted the growth of North American tourists in the region, “above the national average”, expressing concern about the Spanish market, which has lost space.

“The recovery of the Spanish market is one of the main goals in our program for the presidency of the Alentejo Regional Tourism Promotion Agency (ARPTA)”, emphasized José Manuel Santos, who is a candidate for this agency in the elections on March 31.

According to the president of ERT Alentejo and Ribatejo, the Alentejo region also achieved good results last year in terms of average income per available room (RevPAR), with “a growth of 7.9%, in line with the national average”.

“It was a very good year for tourism, which also opens up good prospects for this year, in which we are already working hard”, pointed out José Manuel Santos, admitting that “there is still room for the region to grow” in this area.

Assuming that tourism in Alentejo “in order to grow in demand, it also has to grow in supply”, the person in charge revealed that the opening of new hotel units and the expansion of some existing ones are planned for this year.

“With all the dynamics that the destination will have in 2025, starting with the fact that we are the Guest Destination at the Lisbon Tourism Exchange (BTL), we believe that it will also be a good year and where we will be able to reinforce these 2024 numbers”, he added.

In national terms, the tourist accommodation sector registered 31.6 million guests and 80.3 million overnight stays in 2024, up 5.2% and 4.0% compared to 2023, increasing total revenues by 10.9% to 6.7 billion euros, according to INE.