Airliners of the world
The worst might be over for the aviation industry as the latest international traffic data for April 2009 has shown passenger demand fall only 3.1 percent compared to an 11.1 percent fall in March.
April figures were released by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) on Wednesday, showing the average passenger load factor was 74.4% compared to 72.1% in March.
Despite the improved figures, IATA’s chief executive Giovanni Bisignani stressed that the industry was “not out of the woods yet.”
“The demand improvements that we saw in April are welcome. But the 3.1% decline in passenger demand still outstripped the 2.5% cutback in capacity.
“There is no improvement in revenues as yields continue to fall. And freight remains at shockingly low levels”
Bisignani was referring to the international cargo demand figures which fell 21.7 percent, the fifth consecutive month figures have been in the negative 20 percent range.
The strongest cargo performers were Middle Eastern carriers (-11%) whilst European, North American, Asia-Pacific and African carriers were similar with -23.3%, -22.4%, -22.3% and –18.8% respectively.
“The worst may be over. However, we have not yet seen any signs that recovery is imminent”
As per his previous arguments put forward before, Bisignani stressed again the importance of flexibility and change in order to weather the economic storm.
“Airlines remain constrained by old rules that restrict basic commercial freedoms such as access to markets and capital. Much of the cost base remains out of our control—from volatile fuel prices to monopoly infrastructure charges.
“Many governments simply don’t understand the need for urgent change…to manage through this ongoing crisis, every
player in the air transport value chain must be prepared to drive change”
From:http://www.etravelblackboardasia.com/article.asp?id=62147&nav=109
June 5th, 2009 at 4:04 am
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