Tourism has become Madeira's primary economic activity, with agriculture, fishing, and industry facing significant limitations for employment and development.
The island contends with challenges such as its topography, sea depth, and lack of raw materials, in addition to insularity that increases export costs and limits the domestic market. A widespread labor shortage is also a concern.
Madeira's airport is identified as a bottleneck for tourism, with periods of inoperability impacting profitability and investment. While hotel bed capacity grows minimally, local accommodation is proliferating, boosting the GDP.
The article posits that the pace of GDP growth is increasingly falling into the hands of municipal councils, driven by the expansion of local accommodation, which now accounts for half of the tourism business. The size of the municipalities and the region's reliance on tourism raise questions about the need for cross-cutting coordination of this activity.
