Spain Business Brief - Monday January 12 2009
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By h.b. - Jan 12, 2009 - 12:32 PM
Magdalena Álvarez defends the Spanish Airports Authority and takes action against Iberia following Barajas chaos.

Following the chaos over the weekend in Barajas Airport in Madrid, the Minister for Development, Magdalena Álvarez, has defended the performance of the Spanish Airports Authority AENA, and opened disciplinary action against Iberia. The Minister’s take on the weekend was that ‘the airport was closed for four hours and normality was totally recovered in two days’.
Meanwhile Iberia has started legal action against the pilots union SEPLA for 13 million €. They say that is the amount they have lost comes from the cancelling of 500 flights.
Meanwhile the cancellations have continued today as the conflict enters its fourth week, and Iberia has apologised for the delays and cancellations caused.

The AVE high speed train in Spain has once again beaten the plane for user numbers in November. The number to use domestic air services was down 19.5% in November compared to the same month in 2007 at 2.8 million, while the numbers to use the AVE high speed train was up 28% at more than 1.7 million users.
RENFE Spanish railways said that saw 44.2 million travellers over all their services in November, up 0.3% over the same month in 2007 according to the data from the INE, the National Statistics Institute.
Meanwhile the AVE high speed train between Cataluña and Sevilla or Málaga has cut journey times by 50 minutes to 5 hours and 40 minutes. However the first day of the service on Friday was delayed by the snow.

The Spanish are staying at home more as the recession bites, with cinema numbers down and television viewing times up.
40% of the Spaniards questioned have said they are now going out less because of the crisis. Videogame use is up 16% and pay TV is also doing well according to the Catalan consultancy group Gesop. Internet use is also up.
The group makes some predictions for the next five years – Pay TV up 16.5%, internet use up 13% and the main beneficiary from the situation, Videogames now worth 1,5 billion € a year.

Another area which has seen a dramatic fall in sales is that of quality seeds and fertilizers. It’s because of the high increase in prices for them in the face of the collapse in the price of cereals. Farmers in Spain producing wheat, barley or maize say their sums do not add up and so they are planning less and using cheap seeds.

And finally
You can stop your phone being able to make 905 calls from tomorrow, Tuesday. It comes after there were complaints about abuse and fraud on the lines used in some TV competitions over recent months. The 905 numbers are thus added to the premium numbers 806,807 and 907. IN theory you just have to call your phone company and ask for the right to disconnect the 905 numbers.

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