418 COMPETITION LAW IN TOURISM outbreak; E.2. State support for tourism and state aid; E.2.1. Support at EU level; E.2.2. The importance of State aid; F. Portuguese Response to COVID-19 with Impact in Tourism; F.1. Preliminary remarks; F.2. Highlights on State Aid measures; F.2.1. Under the temporary framework; F.2.1.1. First aid scheme applicable to the national territory; F.2.1.2. Second aid scheme applicable to the national territory; F.2.1.3. Third aid scheme applicable to the national territory; F.2.1.4. Notification of aid scheme for undertakings in Azores; F.2.1.5. Notification of aid scheme for undertakings in Madeira; F.2.2. Under de minimis Regulation; F.2.3. Under the General Block Exemption Regulation; F.2.4. Under the Guidelines on Rescue and Restructuring and article 107(2)(b) TFEU; F.2.4.1. Aid scheme in favour of TAP; F.2.4.2. Aid scheme in favour of SATA; F.2.5. The creation of a new national promotion bank; F.3. The CA’s advocacy efforts given the exceptionality of times; F.4. Possible relevant topics in merger control; F.5. Recovery measures; G. Final Remarks. A. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Portugal comprises the territory on the European mainland that is historically defined as Portuguese, and the Azores and Madeira archipelagos (two of the European Union’s outermost territories). In 2019, 27 million guests visited Portugal, which represented a 7.2% increase in relation to 2018. Furthermore, the sector generated 336.8 thousand jobs (weighing 6.9% in the national economy). Until the COVID-19 economic crisis, tourism was the largest economic activity the country exported, being responsible, in 2019, for 52.3% of services exports and 19.7% of total exports. To this should be added the domestic tourism. Writing about tourism and competition from a Portuguese perspective is as interesting an exercise as it is a challenge, becoming even greater throughout the COVID-19 sanitary and economic crisis and witnessing a major change in the paradigm of the dynamics in the sector and factors influencing the same. Acknowledging the absence of a consolidated definition of tourism, in this contribution we include several tourism-related economic activities which do not fall under the “leisure or hospitality” categories, such as the airline sector, given their relevance for the overall analysis. One may consider that the competitive dynamics in tourism is impacted by the supply side (composed of the players in the market), by the demand side (the addressees of the services and products provided in the same sector) and by the
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