The set of actions making up the government measure to foster Catalan was developed with a team of experts from different fields, formed by Teresa Cabré, Míriam Hatibi, Enric Gomà, Rudolf Ortega, Jordi Font, Eduard Voltas and Custodia Moreno, along with municipal chiefs and other institutions.

Analysis of the use of Catalan in Barcelona

The Survey on the use of language among the population (2018) and the Survey of young people in Barcelona (2020) show a drop in the percentage of people who mainly speak Catalan, particularly in Barcelona, as well as a tendency to stop using Catalan in bilingual situations among young people.

In addition, the survey on the use of language shows that among the mainly Spanish-speaking population, 26% never use Catalan and 27% use it little. Among the mainly Catalan speaking population, the study shows that 11% use it a lot and 19% quite a lot.

Regarding use of languages among young people, the districts with the highest number of young people who normally use Catalan are Gràcia and Sarrià – Sant Gervasi, with over 40%. In contrast, the district with the lowest number of people who use Catalan is Nou Barris, with 5.1%, followed by Ciutat Vella, tripling that figure at 15.9%.

Proposals to foster the use of Catalan

The government measure includes examples of proposals to foster the use of Catalan in the city in these spheres:

• Teaching: digital writing competitions in collaboration with Betevé, plus talks in secondary schools by people who create content in Catalan on social media.
• Youth, leisure and sport: fostering the tie between young people and Catalan with videos on Instagram and Catalan language instruction for trainers and referees.
• Culture, science and universities: more film screenings in Catalan, creation of Language Day in Barcelona, recovery of popular Barcelona toponyms and the promotion of scientific dissemination in Catalan.
• Business, commerce and tourism: support for shops and businesses in the use of Catalan through courses and conversation guides, specific training in Catalan for businesses established in Barcelona and a brief Catalan vocabulary for tourism guides and materials.
• Health, reception and putting down roots: Catalan language courses for foreign health workers, promotion of language volunteers among municipal staff and promotion of Catalan courses by the Linguistic Normalisation Consortium for newly arrived people.
• Administration: training for workers providing support for members of the public, adapted to specific needs, a boost to internal language training for municipal staff and the promotion of language rights among citizens.