Friday 29 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 5): Global air passenger traffic (measured in revenue passenger kilometres or RPKs) grew 5.3% year-on-year in September this year, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA).

In a statement Nov 4, the IATA said this continues the positive growth trend for passenger demand even though the performance was slightly below the August year-over-year rise of 6.3%. September capacity rose 5.1% and load factor rose 0.2 percentage points to 80.3%.

IATA director general and CEO Tony Tyler said that overall, demand for passenger travel is growing in line with expectations.

“We saw, however, some shifting of the sources of that growth in September, largely driven by economic factors.

“The strengthening of the US and Asian economies was offset by weakness in Europe and Latin America,” he said.

Tyler added that the three big stories in September were Europe, Russia and India.

He said European airlines reported 3.9% growth for international demand, and it was a significant drop from the 7.0% reported in August indicating the impact of the Air France crew strike and a general weakening of European economic prospects.

Tyler said year-on-year growth for Russian domestic demand fell to 5.6% in September from 10.1% in August. The impact of price stimulus wore-off and the weakness revealed could be a first indicator of the economic impact of the Russia-Ukraine crisis.

Meanwhile, he said Indian domestic travel spiked with a 26.3% growth in September (several times the 7.6% growth recorded in August) as a result of price stimulation.

 

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