Agrifood activity in Spain plays an important role that goes beyond its share of the economy. Its strategic role in international competitiveness, territorial cohesion and productive autonomy makes it a key sector. This article analyses its capacity to shape the country, taking a closer look at its importance at the regional and provincial level, as well as at the evolution of its relative weight in the national economy in recent decades. Andalusia, Castilla-La Mancha, Castile and León and Catalonia are the autonomous communities that contribute the most to Spain’s agrifood sector, among which Andalusia stands out both for its volume of activity and for its recent dynamism. At the provincial level, Almeria, Seville and Barcelona are the country’s top agrifood hubs.
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David is an economist in the International Economics and Markets Department. He holds a degree in Economics from the University of Castilla-La Mancha and a Master's degree in Economics and Finance from the Centre for Monetary and Financial Studies (CEMFI). Before joining CaixaBank, he worked as an economist at the European Commission, the Bank of Spain, BBVA and Analistas Financieros Internacionales (Afi). His main area of study is macroeconomics, with an emphasis on long-term growth factors, international trade and structural transformations in the global economy.
The retail sector plays a very important role in an eminently service-based economy such as Spain’s, with a larger share compared to other European economies in terms of activity, jobs and number of firms. It is an atomised sector with a considerable number of SMEs and micro-SMEs and is particularly labour-intensive. Moreover, its presence is widespread throughout the length and breadth of our country. All this gives it a certain cohesive role, both from a social and territorial point of view, within the Spanish economy.
Financial inclusion guarantees people access to an appropriate level of financial services. The considerable decline in the number of bank branches in Spain in recent years has increased the risk of financial exclusion for some customers in rural areas. These customers tend to prefer a physical bank branch and specialised offers, especially in the business segment. Within this context, the role played by rural bank branches is twofold: they allow the banking sector to specialised offers in economic sectors critical to large parts of the region, such as agriculture, whilst also maintaining a commitment to financial inclusion.
House prices and the number of sales have surged since mid-last year in Spain, although there are significant geographical differences. In 2024, house prices grew more vigorously in the most expensive areas, thus widening the price gap between municipalities and regions, and this is causing some of the demand to begin to shift towards more affordable areas. At the provincial level, temperature could be a relevant factor: sales are growing more rapidly in the cooler regions of the Northwest of the peninsula, while the traditional tourist areas are experiencing a more gradual increase in demand. In addition, the sharp rise in house prices in the major cities is causing a shift in housing demand towards more affordable peripheral areas, where house prices are expected to experience rapid growth in 2025.
The tourism industry is a key sector for Spain's economy and the decline forecast in tourism for 2020 will have a major impact on the country's level of economic activity. However, this economic impact will not be spread evenly throughout Spain as there are big differences between regions in the relative importance of the tourism sector. We expect the islands and Mediterranean communities to be more exposed than the average in Spain, while inland regions will suffer less.
Executive summary. Expansion, resilience and new challenges for the Spanish agrifood sector
International tourism tends to be the main focus of attention when we talk about Spain’s tourism industry. However, domestic tourism also plays an important role: Spaniards travel more than 175 million times a year within Spain and generate an associated tourist expenditure of 30,000 million euros1. In this article, we examine the recent trends in Spain’s domestic tourism and discuss the main differences between domestic and international tourists.
- 1A trip is considered to be any journey made to a main destination outside the person’s customary zone of residence that entails at least one overnight stay outside this zone.
In recent years, rural tourism has become increasingly important in Spain, opening up new avenues to diversify the sources of income for rural economies. In this article, based on internal CaixaBank data, we look at the upturn in the sector after the COVID-19 pandemic and its implications for the economic resilience of rural Spain and for the tourism industry, given its high level of sustainability both from the point of view of its impact on the environment and its greater geographic diversification and more limited seasonality compared to other, more traditional forms of tourism such as sun, sea and sand destinations.
The Spanish housing market is in the midst of a boom, driven by lower interest rates, the improvement in purchasing power and population growth. Demand continues to grow sharply, with foreign buyers playing a notable role, while supply is also steadily gaining traction, although it still does not compensate for the housing deficit accumulated since 2021. House prices continue to accelerate, now exceeding the peak reached in 2007 in nominal terms, and signs of overvaluation are beginning to become apparent. However, the current context differs from the one prior to the bursting of the housing bubble: rather than an oversupply, there is a serious housing deficit, and that is what primarily explains the pressure on prices; moreover, households, the construction and developer sector, and the financial system are in a strong financial position. We expect prices and sales to remain dynamic in the coming quarters, underscoring the need to increase the supply of affordable housing.
This winter’s drought has highlighted one of the most important challenges facing Spain’s agrifood sector: improving how water resources are used given the prospect of their availability becoming more limited.
The indicators show that the growth rate of Spain’s tourism sector is normalising after the exceptional figures of 2022-2024, driven by the post-pandemic recovery and the consequent rebound in the consumption of services. The trends observed at the end of 2024 are continuing in 2025: the sector remains attractive to a growing number of international tourists, while the presence of resident tourists in local destinations is diminishing in favour of increased prominence abroad. Even so, this year the sector will once again be key for the Spanish economy. According to our forecasts, tourism GDP will grow by 2.7%, thanks to the solid start to the year, the increase in household disposable income, the revival of some European economies and the moderation of tourism inflation.
The demand for housing among non-resident foreign buyers has grown sharply in recent years, especially after the pandemic, consolidating itself as one of the main drivers of Spain's real estate market. This boom is a response to several attractions which Spain has to offer, such as economic stability, the perception of security, good connectivity and a real estate offer that remains competitive. The profile of these buyers and the areas of interest have diversified, with an increase in the variety of nationalities and chosen locations: the influence of the United Kingdom has reduced, Poland is in the top 5 buyer nationalities, interest from the US and Latin America is on the rise, and new centres of interest are emerging in less traditional areas, such as Castellón, Asturias, Huelva and Córdoba.
The publication of the latest agricultural census by Spain’s National Statistics Institute, corresponding to 2020, not only allows us to describe exhaustively how the Spanish agricultural sector has evolved in recent decades in supply terms but also to detect any structural changes and predict new trends, strengths and weaknesses. The typical farm is still characterised by being small, economically modest and run primarily by a relatively older male, with little generational renewal, one of the major handicaps facing the sector. However, successive censuses reveal a gradual process of increased concentration among farms, which are becoming larger and more productive, as well as a greater presence of women in the sector.