Canary Islands Test Tourist Donations
The Canary Islands will introduce a voluntary donation scheme for visitors, choosing not to follow other European destinations with a compulsory tourist tax. The new Canary Islands Tourism Regeneration and Nature Restoration Fund, known as REGNEXT, will allow tourists and travel companies to support environmental and community projects across the islands.
REGNEXT donation scheme at a glance
- Destination: Canary Islands
- Islands covered: Tenerife, Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, La Palma, La Gomera and El Hierro
- Type of payment: voluntary donation, not a mandatory tourist tax
- Purpose: nature restoration and community projects
- How it works: online donations to specific pilot schemes
- Travel partners: easyJet holidays, Jet2.com, Jet2holidays and Tui
- Tourism context: 18.39 million visitors in 2025
According to the Canary Islands government, REGNEXT is a voluntary funding scheme designed to support environmental and community projects. Instead of adding a fixed charge to each holiday, the scheme will let visitors and travel companies donate online to specific pilot projects linked to nature restoration, local communities and long-term destination care.
The fund is expected to support habitat restoration, biodiversity protection, emissions reduction, climate adaptation, landscape improvement and affordable housing initiatives. For visitors, the most useful part is choice: donations should be linked to named projects rather than disappearing into a general tourism budget, making it easier to understand what a contribution is meant to support.
The scheme’s success will depend on whether tourists can quickly see what they are funding and whether the money reaches visible projects on the islands. A voluntary model avoids the immediate resistance that often follows new visitor taxes, but it also relies on enough people choosing to take part without being forced at checkout.
