“Our main tourism challenges are sustainability, digitalization, innovation and improving the experience”

This is the main thing meeting of scope national which connects public and private institutions with the aim of promoting urban transformation and smart mobility, with emphasis on citizenship and sustainability as main axes.

Toni Perez participated in this initiative during the conference on ‘Smart tourism: new technologies to improve the citizen experience”. In this table, moderated by John Mora, vice-president of the Ametic Smart Cities Commission, the head of Smart Cities and Tourism T-Systems, Pedro Garibi, the director of specialized sales, participated with the president of the Provincial Council of Alicante and the mayor of Benidorm, of Telefónica Spain, José María Troya, and the president of Segittur, Enrique Martínez.

These experts addressed the main transformations underway in the field of sustainability and digitalization to improve competitiveness in Digital Spain 2026.

According to Pérez, “implementing and betting on the digital transformation of the tourism sector is essential to boost its innovationto promote greater accessibility of the destinations and improve their management and governance.

At this point, the head of the provincial institution and the main tourist city of Costa Blancaargued in his speech that there are “many challenges in tourism, such as the urgency to deepen sustainability, digitalization, innovation and improvement of the experience in the destination”, and for this, it has chosen to “face this digital transformation and use it to our advantage to consolidate our progress as an intelligent and innovative territory, a reference for the Mediterranean region”.

Perez defended the need to promote triple environmental, social and economic sustainability in order to generate resilient territories and ensure that the cities and villages of tomorrow are capable of generating an ecosystem where innovation and structuring coexist and promote styles of lifehealthy and adapted to the needs of citizens and the environment.

This debate space was promoted by Green Cities and S-Movingwho have been promoting a sustainable future for Spanish cities and municipalities for 15 years, promoting autonomous and intelligent mobility.

Throughout these days, a large team of professionals addressed aspects such as: new models In mobility and technologies, innovation in cities, the future against climate change, municipal innovation strategies in the Smart field, the transformation of infrastructures and alternative fuels or the European mission of cities and the lever of urban change and the generation of profits, among other aspects.

Pérez detailed some of the initiatives that the provincial institution promotes in the field of tourism, such as the project “Costa Blanca Smart 2.0” with which it should strengthen the integration and efficiency of tourism management, as well as improve its accessibility and sustainability; and generate a positive impact by attracting tourists, managing natural resources and creating jobs and business opportunities in the tourism sector.

This initiative will continue the digital transformation initiated in the municipalities of Alicante, expanding its scope and connecting smart platforms to promote an authentic provincial tourism interoperability network.

Water and sustainability

During his speech at the symposium, the president highlighted other relevant aspects regarding the province of Alicante, “including the pressure on the water resources has always been very high, making water the key factor in achieving sustainability in these regions. For this reason, as Toni Pérez pointed out, “for decades we have been a world example of water management.”

In this sense, he traced the complex system of the Marina Baixa region, which since the 1980s has combined surface and underground resources, reusing water repeatedly for tourist usessupply and irrigation.

Currently, as he continued, “progress in automation and digitalization have allowed the optimization of networks, achieving record technical efficiencies, highlighting the case of Benidorm, a leading city in Europe and one of the three most efficient in the world.

Likewise, he highlighted the work of the Deputation of Alicante by providing support to the municipalities of the province in terms of supply and sanitation. Therefore, with the aim of strengthening the implementation of the digitalization of the water cycle, the provincial institution has presented a proposal entitled “AIgua Alicante Intelligent Water: digitalized management of the integral water cycle at the provincial level”, which will receive a state investment of 8.2 million of euros.

The project objectives will be based on specific actions on the supply and sanitation networks of 52 municipalities, 47 of which have fewer than 5,000 inhabitants. All these towns are integrated into the telemetry system of the Provincial Council of Alicante.

Projects in Benidorm

Also as Mayor of Benidormthe main tourist city of the Costa Blanca, the president presented to the public some of the most interesting projects that the city is developing in this area.

As he explained, the Benidorm model “is synonymous with efficient management of resources, job creation and redistribution of wealth.” As he stressed, “we are working to establish a observatory tourist which will be based in the new pole Benidorm Innovation Center and will bring together different parameters: water consumption, energy, waste, urban mobility and environmental or economic measures.

Furthermore, the president and mayor continued by indicating that since 2018 “we have been absolutely involved in the management of the control of ability in the beaches via a web portal with real-time information and deployment of sensors that provide us with information on the state of the sea, the state of the water and sand, meteorology and environmental parameters.

“We are concerned and concerned about the beaches and the action of coastal dynamics; monitoring “It is constant and we have already designed our own ecosystem of artificial dunes in which we are currently working and whose arrangement will be parallel to the beach line, in the upper part and in the final part of the ravines,” he concluded.