In 1990, the current bishop of Mallorca, Sebastià Taltavull, aged 78 and from Ciutadella, was vicar general of Menorca and a great activist in the environmental movement. "As a delegate for the diocese's youth," he asserts, "I helped organize many demonstrations in defense of the land. I also wrote articles of denunciation for the newspapers. It was clear to me that defending the territory was defending the people, their identity, and their language." At the end of 1973, Menorca led the green struggle in the Archipelago, demanding the protection of the Albufera del Grau, north of Maó, where a mega-urbanization with an exotic name, Shangri-La, had been planned. It was not until 1995, almost two decades later, that the site was declared a Natural Park.

The National Police have reported four militants from Arran Menorca for an alleged hate crime for wearing t-shirts with the slogan 'K*ll a tourist, free a house'. All four were summoned to testify at the courts of Mahón last August. The complaint was made public by Arran this Thursday on social media, after the Public Prosecutor's Office rejected the appeal filed by the organization against the decision to initiate judicial proceedings.

The entity Pla de Mallorca XXI presented the conference The Pla facing its transformation which will be held on October 30 and 31 in Lloret with the aim of addressing a profound debate on the territorial changes that are taking place in the interior of Mallorca as a consequence of the intense touristification of the island and the chalet-style development that threaten and are already a reality in the center of the island.

"We invested 150,000 euros to transform mobile coverage antennas and satellite data into occupancy sensors at 150 beaches in the Balearic Islands. This data, together with that provided in real time by lifeguards and the history from previous years, has allowed for the generation of a predictive model within the beach application to have an approximation of the influx that there may be over the next six days." This is how the Vice President of the Government and Minister of Economy, Finance and Innovation, Antoni Costa, responded to the question from Més per Menorca deputy Joana Gomila regarding the 4 million euro investment in smart sensors that the Executive announced at Fitur in January 2026. That is to say, one of the methods that the Government has used to measure the influx at the beaches has been the count made by the lifeguards and the data from mobile coverage antennas.

The Balearic Islands have received between January and August of this year a total of 11.7 million international tourists, 2% more than the same period in 2025, according to the data on Tourist Movements at Borders released this Friday by the National Statistics Institute (INE).

United Airlines will strengthen the direct connection between Palma and New York in the summer of 2027 with a daily flight between Newark airport and Son Sant Joan. The company plans to operate three weekly frequencies starting in March and increase them to seven from May 26 until October. The route, launched in 2022, is currently the only non-stop connection between Mallorca and the United States.

The Artà City Council plenary session approved this Monday the initial Point Modification number 7 of the Subsidiary Norms (NS), which adapts the municipal planning to the Intervention Plan for Tourist Areas of Mallorca (PIAT) and establishes new limits on the municipality's tourist capacity. The proposal went ahead with the favorable votes of the PSIB-PSOE and El Pi and the abstentions of UIA-MÉS per Mallorca and the PP.

Platges de Comte almost tripled its estimated physical capacity this summer, with 1,513 people at the same time, according to a pilot study by the Ibiza & Formentera Preservation Sustainability Observatory. The data was recorded on August 4 at 3:00 PM, when the beach far exceeded the 537 people it is considered able to accommodate according to the criteria applied in the study.

The Council of Ministers approved this Tuesday the new Airport Regulation Document (DORA III), which will mark the investments, capacity, and tariffs of the airports of Aena between 2027 and 2031. For the Balearic Islands, the approval consolidates a new increase in air traffic and places the three major airports of the Islands at the threshold of 50 million annual passengers by the end of the period.

After a summer marked by social mobilizations against the tourism model, GOB and Terraferida already have a date to personally convey their demands to the President of the Government, Margalida Prohens. The head of the Executive will receive the representatives of the environmental organizations on Tuesday, September 24, at 6 p.m.

A controversial song, in a tone of humor and protest, has been the response from the Germans Honk! and Der Partycrasher to the criticisms from the German citizens themselves against the typical tourism of the Ballermann 6, where the street of the Jamón is located, an area linked to German party and binge-drinking tourism. The title, Mallehater go home, is already a clear statement of intent. The song mixes two concepts: on one hand, the slogan 'go home' and, on the other, 'Malle', the colloquial way in which part of German society refers to Mallorca.

Celestí Alomar (Llubí, 1949) ponders the future of tourism from the Majorcan Col·lectiu Alternatives, previously he did so from the Administration. He looks at it from the Islands, which historically anticipate what will happen to the Spanish sector as a whole, and with the experience of having been Director General of Tourism Strategy for Felipe González and of having had a portfolio in the Pacte de Progrés that created the pioneering ecotax.

Cala Saladeta was filled with people this Saturday during the Popular Xindriada convened by the Joves d'Eivissa association. The gathering also served as a protest event to denounce the consequences of overpopulation that, according to participants, the island is suffering.

In the context of the debate about the need for a 'new tourism model', a good friend, in an opinion article, asked a few days ago 'what Mallorca do we want to explain to the world?' and then questioned whether we should continue promoting sun and beach tourism or if we should focus tourist promotion 'also on the landscape, culture, gastronomy, local produce, heritage, innovation, talent, and a Mediterranean way of life'. Personally, to be able to accept the proposal, I find the adverb 'also' superfluous and I need to know if the visitors we want to encourage to come and enjoy our 'local produce' will drive up prices and, as a consequence, raise the economic bar required to go to the restaurants we've been going to all our lives, in other words, if they will gentrify us. If that's the case, I say it now, I'd rather stick with 'traditional' mass tourism.

This never-ending summer has been a time of laments and litanies. We are more saturated than ever and have protested more than ever. But the gatherings, the demonstrations, the al fresco dinners, and the demands have only served to confirm the abyss between the street and the offices of those who decide about our lives, a gap that began to open legislatures ago and has now reached grandiose dimensions. This is not the land of brave politicians and those who truly command do not usually run in elections.

Madò Farta attacks again. After a summer marked by numerous mobilizations against mass tourism, the activist joins to citizen initiatives, such as those organized by Brunzit, and has called for an action to collectively cool off on August 29th in the Plaça d'Espanya in Palma.

In Mallorca, one of the great allies of the boom of tourism were the so-called tourist songs. The lyrics praised the island's scenic wonders. The seed was already sown in the 40s of the 20th century by the Majorcan musician Pere Bonet Mir (1917-2002), better known as Bonet de Sant Pere and professionally Bonet de San Pedro. In the midst of the post-war period, in the song Bajo el cielo de Palma, he proclaimed to the four winds “paisajes lindos tiene Mallorca”. He would deal with the same theme in Un viejo hogar en la isla, Juntito al mar, Cala d’Or, and Canto a Mallorca. These utterly naive compositions contrasted with the famous song Raska-yú, which in 1943 the island artist wrote as a parody of death in times of great misery (Franco's regime even censored it, suspecting it contained an implicit criticism of the dictatorship).

More than 800 people gathered on Friday evening in the Plaça de la Catedral in Ciutadella to denounce the tourist saturation that Menorca is suffering. The call, promoted by the Via Menorca platform, brought together citizens from different parts of the island for a popular, protest-oriented dinner.

The keyboard chords of a version of Whitney Houston coming from the Hotel Mariant Park are mixed with the notes, at full volume, of Barbie Girl, a hit from the 90s coming from the surroundings of the Hotel Playamar. The August night is heavy and the hotel terraces are full of tourists looking for the promised entertainment. Right in the middle, immutable and eternal, oblivious to anachronism, remain the millenary stones of the Talayotic settlement of l’Illot.

The violent outburst at the end of the last and successful demonstration called with the aim of achieving less tourism, more life, is another indicator of a whole series of contradictory policies implemented simultaneously in our Autonomous Community. When the CAIB was constituted (1983), it assumed, among other things, competences in urbanism and territorial planning, but the State reserved the cards that could condition, directly or indirectly, urban and territorial plans: economic policy, taxation, justice, police, and large inter-community infrastructures, including the energy distribution network and ports and airports of general interest. Since then, the objectives of the policies implemented by both administrations have not always been consistent.