Get up & go • Chapter summary

Spain’s economy is diversified, with tourism, ICT, retail, and industry all making up significant portions of GDP. Its recovery since the destructive 2007 financial crisis has been impressive, and in recent years both central and regional government initiatives to tackle economic challenges have proven to be highly effective.

In this chapter we interviewed a wide variety of companies, including organizations such as the Circulo de Empresarios, Catalonia Trade & Investment, the Association of Internationalized Industrialised Companies (AMEC), and Invest in Spain (ICEX). Each entity is dedicated to the economic recovery and diversification from its own particular angle.

An underlying thread that unites these organizations is the urgent need to internationalize and digitalize the economy, as well as improve Spain’s high unemployment rates, estimated to be at 14.2% in September 2019 by Eurostat.

It is impossible to discuss internationalization, and the Spanish economy as a whole without referring to the SMEs that generate 62.2% of added value and constitute 72.4% of employment in Spain. The need to increase the exports of these companies is most pressing in terms of strengthening Spain’s reputation as a global economy.

However, Spain’s more recent past points to a promising future, with levels of exports rising YoY. Marta Blanco, President of the international division of the Spanish Confederation of Employers and Industries (CEOE), told us that the degree of openness of the Spanish economy is 20 points higher than what it was in 2009 and nine points more than the highest point prior to the 2007 crisis. To further improve these figures, all these organizations work to create networks of partnerships and programs in order to continue boosting these levels and make Spain one of the strongest and most international economies in the European bloc.

Perhaps the best tool for internationalizing today is the digitalization of both the public and private sectors. Every single company we spoke to highlighted the urgency of this task in terms of continuing growth and becoming a reference in the revolution that is Industry 4.0

The greatest challenge to achieving this is effectively preparing the population in terms of technological education, in order to fill the roles that a new digital economy requires. According to John de Zulueta, President of the Circulo de Empresarios, the new digital environment is increasingly robotized and focused on big data, IoT, AI, cybersecurity, blockchain technology, machine learning, and quantum computing. It makes no sense that there are currently about 135,000 technological jobs that cannot be covered because of the lack of professionals with the right preparation for them. In order to bridge this gap, further initiatives, coupled with collaboration between the private sector and universities is fundamental. Even still, over the last six years, Spain has successfully generated 2.5 million jobs, more than any other country in the EU. ✖