On Wednesday, 24 March, the Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, presented the plan “Spain, Audiovisual Hub of Europe”.
The plan’s goals are to turn Spain into a leading country in audiovisual production in the digital age, a hub for international investment and talent, and strengthen its industry-services ecosystem to export and compete in international markets.
It includes a public investment of 1.603 billion euros between 2021 and 2025 and its goal is to increase the audiovisual production made in Spain by 30% at the end of that period.
15 measures will be promoted along 4 axes:
- Promotion, digitisation and internationalisation of audiovisual activities to attract investment.
- Improvement of financial and fiscal instruments.
- Talent availability and human capital development
- Regulatory reforms and removal of administrative barriers
The plan includes public investments and reforms to achieve a significant boost in the entire value chain for the audiovisual industry, based on the strengths that Spain possesses, such as a solvent audiovisual industry, well-trained and prestigious professionals, a globally recognized creative capacity and a comparative advantage in the growing global market for audiovisual production in Spanish.
The plan is based on an integral perspective of the audiovisual sector in all its formats (cinema, series, shorts, advertising, video games or animation) and an integrating vision that transcends the audiovisual to link with culture, tourism and the country’s own image.
During the presentation of the plan, Pedro Sánchez pointed out that “the audiovisual industry is key because of its weight in employment and in the economy. But also because of its weight in our cultural identities and in our international projection”.
The plan includes public investments and reforms to achieve a significant boost to the entire value chain of the audiovisual industry based on Spain’s strengths, such as a solvent audiovisual industry, well-trained and prestigious professionals, a creative capacity recognised worldwide and a comparative advantage in the growing global market for audiovisual production in Spanish.
The first axis of the plan (digitising, internationalising and attracting investment) has a planned investment of 240 million euros. It includes actions to digitise both audiovisual production and audience monitoring, to promote the implementation and improvement of platforms dedicated to Spanish audiovisual production and its distribution, which favour its international commercialisation, especially those projects that generate collaborative ecosystems between SMEs.
In addition, a single point of information and a centralised point of contact will be created, the ‘Spain Audiovisual Hub Bureau’, which will provide information, assistance and support to potential investors in the sector, both to foreign companies wishing to invest in Spain and to Spanish companies interested in internationalising their activity. This area will develop a Programme for the internationalisation of the audiovisual sector, developed by the Ministry of Culture and Sport and ICEX Spain Export and Investment, and a Programme for the attraction of filming and foreign investment.
The second axis (improvement of financial and fiscal instruments) includes two types of measures: those aimed at facilitating access to financing, on the one hand, and those dedicated to the application of fiscal incentives for audiovisual production in Spain, on the other.
The objective of the axis dedicated to the availability of talent and the development of human capital is to adapt training plans to the skills demanded by the industry; and to support the training that companies themselves offer their workers. In collaboration with the Ministry of Education and Vocational Training and the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade, a training programme for employment in the digital economy will be launched.
Among the reforms contemplated in the Plan are the draft General Law on Audiovisual Communication and the draft Law on Cinema.
In order to properly monitor the measures of this plan, an annual report on the audiovisual sector will be drawn up, including a description of the different subsectors (cinema, series, animation, cinema advertising, video games, eSports, visual effects, etc.), their evolution and growth prospects.
You can download the full document here (in Spanish) and find more information on the ICEX’s website (English) and the Moncloa’s website (Spanish).
