After fifteen months of the worst tourism crisis on the Costa del Sol, with the majority of hotels forced to close, while still running up significant costs, many are reluctant to reopen and take more risks because of the low occupancy rates.

The delay in the arrival of British tourists is taking its toll on many hoteliers and this means that the re-opening of establishments has slowed.

The Costa del Sol hoteliers associaton (Aehcos), chaired by José Luque, has revealed that Benalmádena, Estepona and Mijas are the Costa towns in which only around half of their establishments are open.

A report published by the association says that in Mijas only 45.5 per cent of the hotels have reopened, while in Estepona some 50 per cent have done so and in Benalmádena the figure is 58 per cent, being the three locations in which the return to normality is taking longer.

However, at the head of the table, Nerja already has 92 per cent of its hotels operating and Malaga and Marbella, some 73 per cent of this type of accommodation.

In June, occupancy rates reached 40.15 per cent in Malaga province and the association’s forecast for July is 49 per per cent.

The month of June closed with some 55,844 hotel accommodation places available which represents 66.4 per cent of the total offer. In addition, during the month of June, 37 establishments were reopened, going from 179 on 1 June to 216 on 30 June.

Luque points out there is greater demand from the national market and to a lesser extent from international markets, other than the UK, for obvious reasons.

He said there is concern about the situation of the British market given the circumstances that keep Spain, except for the Balearic Islands, at amber on the country’s ‘traffic light’ system, and considers it vital for the coast to become a ‘green’ destination to, at least, save the month of August from the significant economic impact of the loss of some 185,000 overnight stays a week and between 20 and 25 million euros a week in lost revenue.