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2020 was a tough year for the tourism industry. All the data that became available at year-end show that the impact of the pandemic on the sector has been devastating. After a total standstill during the months of March, April and May 2020, tourism demand failed to pick up appreciably during the rest of the year, even during the summer months when the infection rate seemed to be under control. Moreover, the waves of COVID-19 occurring at the end of 2020 and beginning of 2021, together with the various measures to restrict movement and businesses, have kept tourist numbers at a minimum, aggravating the losses suffered by the sector.

The outbreak of the pandemic in early 2020 has had unprecedented repercussions in many areas of the economy. One of these has been household consumption, the main component of GDP and traditionally considered an indicator of the health of the economy and the well-being of society. Because of the restrictions on business and travel during the health crisis caused by COVID-19, the drop in consumption was much greater than during previous crises. The positive side is that once restrictions were lifted, Spain’s consumption has rebounded more sharply in 2021 than in the past.

The outbreak of war in Ukraine has overshadowed the positive outlook we were forecasting for the Spanish economy in 2022. While, at the end of last year, some factors had already appeared on the scene that hindered the economic recovery, such as the spread of the Omicron variant, disruptions in global supply chains and inflationary pressures, especially from energy prices, the armed conflict in Ukraine has become the main focus of attention and the major conditioning factor for short-term economic developments.

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of the agrifood sector as a mainstay of the Spanish economy. During the months of lockdown, the entire food chain (which includes farmers, breeders, fishermen, cooperatives and the food industry, wholesalers, retailers, distributors and logistics operators) had to adapt quickly to secure the population's food supply. In retrospect, it is only fair to acknowledge the excellent response by the whole sector in tackling this challenge.

The situation of the tourism sector improved considerably during the summer months, outperforming the projections of many of the companies in the industry. The vaccination of a large part of the population, the implementation of the EU Digital COVID Certificate, the great pent-up demand for tourism services and the easing of restrictions in the hospitality industry have been the compendium of factors that have supported a significant and necessary recovery for the sector. 

The retail trade is one of the Spanish economy’s main service sectors. The sector as a whole has shown itself to be much more resilient than other services, posting a much smaller reduction in activity than the slump observed in the Spanish economy as a whole. Part of this commendable resilience comes from retail’s extraordinary ability to adapt to online sales channels, speeding up a trend that had already been taking hold for years and which we quantify in this report based on internal CaixaBank data. In 2021, the outlook for retail is one of recovery thanks to progress in the vaccination campaign, which will enable a gradual but rapid lifting of restrictions in Q2 2021 on trade and movement, including international.