The number of golf members in Spain has settled above 285,000 – specifically 288,315 – according to data from the last official count carried out on May 1. This amount represents a decrease in the number of licenses of 26,986 with respect to the first of the year, after the processing of annual cancellations due to bank returns in March, an action that is executed after a warning notification, which means that from this moment on the number of members will increase little by little as the year goes by.
In percentage terms, the decrease experienced in the January-May period represents a decrease of 8.5% in relation to the count made at the beginning of the year, figures that can be explained by the current economic crisis that affects all areas of Spanish society and that in the world of Spanish golf is especially palpable since 2010.
With this dynamic, taking into account the curves experienced in recent years, the forecast is for 2013 to end around 290,000 licenses, the same as in mid-2006, the last throes of the economic boom before the onset of the global crisis in 2008.
Looking at data with a longer historical perspective, golf continues to be one of the fastest-growing sports specialties in the last two decades. Not surprisingly, in 1994 the number of federated members was 81,000, slightly less than 200,000 today.
In the context of this decreasing environment, it should be noted that the Community of Madrid accounts for a third of the number of members – specifically, 85,790 at the beginning of May – while Andalusia, second in the Ranking of Territorial Federations, is close to 45,000, consolidating its position ahead of Catalonia, third in this list with almost 33,500 members.
At a certain distance are the Valencian Community -almost 20,000 members-; the Basque Country, almost 19,000; and Castilla y León, with almost 15,500. Galicia, with almost 11,000 licenses, joins the group of Autonomous Communities with five-digit golf licenses, a level that is within reach of Asturias, with almost 9,500.
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