Middle Eastern carriers recorded the strongest growth in July among all regions for worldwide traffic, the global Air Transport Association, or IATA, said in its report on Wednesday. “And the political rhetoric on both sides of the Atlantic is not encouraging for further trade liberalisation”, said Alexandre de Juniac, IATA’s new director general and ceo. Capacity climbed 4.7 percent and load factor dipped 0.5 percentage points to 86.7 percent, which was still the highest among regions.
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North American carriers saw freight volumes expand 4.1 per cent in July 2016 compared to the same period past year, and capacity increase by 3.4 per cent.
Asia-Pacific airlines’ witnessed the second highest growth of 9.8 percent in passenger traffic growth compared to the year-ago period. Global freight volumes (which grew 1.3 per cent in July) continue to suffer from the strength of the U.S. dollar, which has kept the USA export market under pressure. The strong European performance was led by an increase in export orders in Germany, while Middle Eastern airlines are experiencing some of the best performance in terms of demand, but the amount is about half of what it was the previous three years. Capacity increased 8.6 percent and load factor climbed 0.9 percentage points to 81.7 percent. “Aside from the Middle East, Europe is the only one of the major regions whose worldwide traffic has now surpassed the level reached during the rebound following the global financial crisis”, IATA senior economist David Oxley said.
Middle East was the only region, which witnessed a double-digit growth in July. Growth in ATKs is largely attributable to increased belly capacity from ongoing additions to the widebody passenger fleet, IATA said. “Having increased by nearly 14% each year on average between 2012 and 2015, the rate of growth has halved since”, Oxley said, adding “this is mainly attributable to slower growth on the market between the Middle East and Asia, with signs suggesting more traffic is flying directly between Europe and Asia”.
The lower figure is attributed to slower cargo growth between the region and Asia. In contrast, Africa was down 6.8 percent and Latin America dropped 5.6 percent.
African carriers recorded a 6.8% decrease in year-on-year freight demand in July 2016 – the largest decline in seven years. African airlines’ capacity surged by 31.3 per cent on the back of long-haul expansion (from a small base).
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IATA (International Air Transport Association) represents some 265 airlines comprising 83% of global air traffic.
