The general slow down in many industry sectors across Europe is not being taken lying down by the tourism authorities responsible for the Balearic islands that include Ibiza, Mallorca and Menorca.

Menorca often remains in the shadow of its larger neighbour Mallorca and over recent years has seen fewer British tourists travelling there. The island is still very popular with Spanish tourists but figures released for September last year revealed the continuing reduction in visitor numbers which, amazingly, have halved since 2001.

In conjunction with several large travel operators the authorities have decided to take action and generated a plan that has allocated 9 million euros of public money to promote the island over the next three years. For their part, local hotel operators are contributing to the plan by upgrading facilities and travel operators are also signed up to increase the number of flights and holidays they offer to the island.

Towards the end of last year a survey of local business owners in Menorca revealed that around 80 per cent of then were experiencing difficult times due to lower visitor numbers. All this bodes well for anyone thinking of taking a holiday in Menorca during 2010. The choice of accommodation will be wide and operators will be trying to go the extra miles in terms of service and facilities, which should make for a great stay on this beautiful island.

Flights to Menorca from 12 UK airports are operated by flythomascook.com during the summer.