News: India to fly high on international air traffic

(FE 31/08/2006) New Delhi - Asia, led by India, will fly high as far as the international air traffic growth is concerned. The region will witness the second highest growth in international air traffic till 2009, only to finish second after Middle East, according to the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA).

The CAPA report says international air traffic in Asia Pacific will have an average annual growth rate of 6.2%, while it is little higher for Middle East where the traffic will grow by 6.8%.

The report projected a world-over growth of around 5% in this regard. Next to Middle East and Asia Pacific is Africa, which is expected to register a high growth rate of 5.8%.

The growth will mostly be concentrated in the Asia and Middle East region as the markets in Europe, North America and Latin America are already touching a reaching saturation point. Currently, Only three regions - Middle East, South and Central Asia - are registering a double-digit growth.

Most of the regions had witnessed a robust market growth in 2004, led by Middle East and Asia Pacific with 24.8% and 20.5% growth respectively.

Traffic in the Asia Pacific region is expected to register a 6.4% annual traffic growth for the next 20 years, according to the Boeing market projections. In India, the number of international passengers grew from 1.91 million in 2004 to 2.25 million in 2005, registering a 17.6% growth. This year the international passenger traffic in the country is expected to grow by over 20%.

According to International Air Transport Association, in terms of revenue passenger kilometres (RPK), which measures the actual passenger traffic, Africa has registered the highest growth in July 2006 over the July 2005. Air traffic in the region grew by 13.1% closely followed by Middle East with 12.9 % growth.

Asia's performance, however, was not very high in RPK terms, with only 4.4% growth in July 2006 over the same month previous year.