Dubai: “The Gulf”

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has released passenger data for June 2022, which shows that the air travel industry is maintaining strong recovery rates.

Total passenger traffic increased by 76.2% in June 2022 compared to the same month last year, mainly due to a strong recovery in international travel, which reached 70.8% from pre-Covid-19 levels.

Willie Walsh, Director General of the International Civil Aviation Organization, said: “Air travel continues to record strong growth rates. People are eager to take advantage of the freedom to travel as much as possible after two years of closures and strict border crossing procedures.

Walsh added: “In the global north, we are seeing a return to peak levels during the summer, confirming expectations of the role of easing travel restrictions in achieving a strong increase in demand for air travel. At the same time, keeping up with this demand is a major challenge today and possibly into the future. Reinforcing the adoption of flexibility in application and slow implementation of the 80-20 rule, the European Commission has announced its intention to return to its adoption.

Airport issues

One look at several major airports is enough to realize the extent of the problems faced by airlines and their passengers, as these airports currently have 64% airspace openings that cannot even support their declared capacity. This prompted them to extend maximum capacity procedures for passengers until the end of October, underscoring the importance of resilience as a key component of the sector’s recovery.

Airport procedures restricting passenger numbers prevent airlines from using strong requirements. Heathrow tried to blame the airlines for the mess. However, service performance data for the first six months of the year indicated the airport’s failure to deliver basic services and fail to meet its targets related to passenger safety, reaching 14.3 points. Although no data for June has yet been released, expectations indicate that the level of airport services will drop to the lowest level since records began.

Global passenger markets

Airlines in the Asia Pacific region recorded a 492% increase in passenger traffic in June. Efficiency increased by 138.9% and load factor by 45.8 percentage points to reach 76.7%. The region is now more open to foreign visitors and tourists, helping to speed up the pace of recovery.

In June, European airlines achieved a 234.5% increase in passenger traffic compared to the same month last year, while capacity increased by 134.5% and load factor increased by 25.8 percentage points to 86.3%. International travel fares in Europe are also higher than pre-Covid-19 levels, based on seasonally adjusted figures.

In June, airlines in the Middle East recorded a 246.5% increase in passenger traffic compared to the same period in 2021. Capacity increased by 102.4% compared to the same period last year, and load factor increased by 32.4 percentage points to 78.0%.

In June, North American Airlines saw a 168.9% increase in passenger traffic. Compared to the same period in 2021. Capacity increased by 95.0% and load factor increased by 24.1 percentage points to 87.7%, the highest among regions.

Passenger traffic for Latin American airlines increased by 136.6% in June compared to the same period in 2021. Capacity increased by 107.4% and load factor increased by 10.3 percentage points to 83.3%. After 20 consecutive months of outperforming other regions in load factor, airlines in Latin America slipped to third place in June.

African airlines saw a 103.6 percent increase in passenger revenue per kilometer in June compared to the same period last year. By June 2022, capacity has increased by 61.9% and load factor has increased by 15.2 percentage points to 74.2%, the lowest percentage among all regions. Meanwhile, international air traffic between Africa and neighboring regions is close to its pre-Covid-19 levels.

Although revenue per passenger kilometer (RPK) in the domestic China market fell 45.0% year-on-year in June, it marked a significant improvement compared to its annual performance in May due to the easing of lockdown measures.

Domestic travel in Japan increased by 146.4% in June compared to the same period last year.