A few days ago the ‘Financial Times’ published ‘How Barcelona lost its way’, an article that has spread like wildfire among those who are for and against this thesis. Without doing a political reading, no one escapes that we are in a pre-electoral context. My objective is none other than to complement, with data, the pessimism poured out.
AND, Barcelona is going well? The city has challenges and opportunities, it has strengths and weaknesses, and it competes in a global arena where it will be impossible to be the best at everything.
According to its citizens, it has cleanliness and public safety issues and that seems indisputable. It is also true, as the article indicates, that most companies that moved their fiscal headquarters in response to the 2017 independence process, they keep her away. A challenge that the city must assume, although the Generalitat has the maximum responsibility.
However, in these last difficult years, when analyzes require a bit of perspective, Barcelona has led the phenomenon of entrepreneurship and has achieved that world-class companies of Enel, Microsoft, Nestlé locate ‘hubs’ of innovation. PepsiCoone of them, updated data: 150 professionals from 30 different countries work on an artificial intelligence project.
The movement of positive impact and the path towards a more sustainable and inclusive economy, has endorsed -B Corp certification- in Spain 174 companies, 82 located in Catalonia, most of them in Barcelona.
As for the tourism2022 has closed with an average of 3.1 nights per visitor, exceeding the average of 2.7 in 2019, something exceptional if we take into account that in the first months of 2022 there were still some restrictions derived from the omicron.
In the organization of events, after having hosted the edition of the ISE – the most important audiovisual congress in the world – we are a few days away from organizing a new edition of the Mobile World Congress, which has a guaranteed presence until 2030. It is normal that Barcelona appears in the fourth position in the world in terms of organization of events, according to the Destination Performance Index of the International Congress and Convention Association.
If we talk about sport, beyond the good performance of Barça, the city organizes the Copa América, an event of global importance, with an economic impact of more than 1,000 million.
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The ‘Financial Times’ itself published its annual ‘ranking’ of the best MBAs in the world and Barcelona -with IESE, Esade and EADA- consolidates its privileged position in Europe only behind London and Paris. Young people around the world choose our ‘business schools’ for training that, according to data revealed by the English newspaper itself, multiply their professional career.
Definitely, Barcelona has neither lost all its brilliance nor is it splendid. It has to be able to get its politicians and, ultimately, all its interest groups to get to work to maximize its strengths, which it has.